Engagements
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An engagement is work sold over time: a scope, deliverables accepted one by one, a schedule, and a price model, from proposal to close.
Each deliverable is accepted on its own, and a change re-quotes before it runs. The point marks money you are paid.
What an engagement holds
An engagement is a case that runs for weeks or years. Every family of Work applies inside it, and these are its own.
| Family | What it does |
|---|---|
| Scope | What the work covers and excludes, in words the client accepts, versioned with every change order |
| Proposal and acceptance | A quote with the scope, the schedule and the price, accepted by click, signature or an agent in the call, as an agreement |
| Deliverables | Each a Thing of its own: versioned with every upload, reviewed by the client in rounds, and accepted, rejected or remedied on its own |
| Change orders | A move that re-quotes the work left; the new price waits on the client, and the scope's history keeps both |
| Schedule and forecasts | A due date per deliverable, and a forecast date from how long the same steps took before, with how sure it is |
| Requests to the client | Items the work needs, with a due date and reminders; the case's clocks and service levels pause while the client owes them |
| Document intake | Files the client sends are read into typed fields, each stamped Inferred and checked by the step's review before the work uses it |
| Time capture | Time logged against each task by the people who did it, approved, and billed against a retainer or an hourly cap |
| Recurring service | An engagement that renews each period, such as a monthly close, with each period's deliverables made from one template |
| Close-out | The last invoice, a handoff packet to the client, and every record kept under its retention and legal hold |
| How it is priced | Charged when | Grade it may sell |
|---|---|---|
| Fixed | Once, on acceptance of the whole | Up to confirmed |
| Milestones | As the engagement enters each state the Offer names | Up to measured, each milestone on its own acceptance |
| Retainer | Each month, with the hours it includes and an hourly rate past them | Up to graded |
| Capped time and materials | Hours captured and approved, up to the cap | Up to graded |
| Contingency | A share of an amount the record holds, such as a sum recovered | confirmed, from an outside party's record |
| Recurring service | Each period, on acceptance of its deliverables | Up to measured |
The assurance grade rule holds: a price model never sells a grade its checks do not earn, and the publish is refused with grade_unearned.
Example
The filings product sells a year of filings by milestones. Starting asks the client for two documents, and the clocks wait for them.
import { define } from 'apis.dev'
/** A year of annual reports for each client,The client's agent reads the engagement while the work waits on it.
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type:Engagements, deliverables and requests, state by state
Every move is a Verb the client, its agent or your team makes, and each writes its Event.
| Thing | States | What moves it |
|---|---|---|
| An engagement | proposed, accepted, started, changed, then closed; or declined, cancelled; waiting on the customer while a request is open | The client's acceptance, the moves the file declares, a cancel under the agreement's terms |
| A deliverable | drafting, in_review, revising, then accepted or rejected and remedied | The step that drafts it, the client's review rounds, and the remedy the Offer names |
| A change order | proposed, then accepted or declined | Your team or the client proposes; the client accepts the new price, and nothing it adds runs before |
| A request to the client | sent, partial, then received, overdue or waived | Each item the client sends; reminders by its channels; your team waives an item |
| A time entry | logged, approved, then billed or written_off | The person who did the work, a reviewer, the next invoice |
| A period of recurring service | open, delivered, accepted, invoiced | The period's template, its deliverables and the client's acceptance |
What clients, your team and agents meet
- A client. One place for the scope, the schedule, each deliverable's versions and every request it owes, with a date it can trust.
- The client's agent. It accepts a proposal, sends documents, reviews a deliverable and approves a change order, all by Verb.
- Your team. Requests that chase themselves, clocks that stop while the client is late, and a forecast built from your own history.
- Finance on both sides. Each charge tied to an accepted deliverable, a milestone or approved hours, on a signed receipt.
An engagement sells work over time on the same Verbs as one order, so each deliverable, change and charge is accepted on its own.
Agents inside the product
An agent per Customer, three ways: a member of its org, a worker on its queue, and the client of record under a mandate, each through the same gate as a person.
Rates and earned autonomy
What a human step costs, what each worker earns, and how a step earns a lighter check: quality plans, calibration on gold tasks, holdouts and findings.