Trust Revisited
Two months ago, I wrote that you can’t write trust into an agreement. I explained why, but I didn’t go on to discuss how you could create trust between the parties.
Today, the folks over at E-Sourcing Forum provide a few good ideas. Learn them well, grasshopper.
The Licensing Handbook Blog is the companion site to the Software Licensing Handbook. Covering licensing topics on a regular basis, Jeffrey Gordon attempts to offer advice, add humor and sometimes even a bit of wit to a practice that most people find abhorrent – namely, reading a contract from start to finish.
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2 Responses to “Trust Revisited”
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"an invaluable guide to one of the software’s industry’s most maddening and, at times, controversial topics..."
-Rick Chapman, Editor Soft*Letter
"I would endorse Jeff's book. It is so great I wish I wrote it myself!"
-Jim Geisman, Owner Marketshare, Inc. -
What you _can_ do is try to build activities and processes into the contract that, over time, generate trust as a byproduct. Toward that end, in many of my contracts I’ve been including a provision requiring periodic status conferences:
“(1) Each party will participate in conferences, by phone or in person, to review status and assumptions and to plan future actions, every X months or as reasonably requested by either party. (2) The parties anticipate that the agenda for such conferences will typically include, as appropriate and without limitation: • progress made; • problems encountered or anticipated; • plans for future action; and • assumptions being made. (3) Unless otherwise agreed, [Party X] will prepare and circulate a brief set of minutes summarizing (i) any decisions made, and, to aid in tracking, (ii) any action items assigned to specific individuals or parties.”
PS: As you might imagine, sales guys usually are not averse to the idea of required periodic status conferences with customers.