Post by Mohammad Dayem A.

A client changed priorities four times, ran out of money, and then sued us. We'd met every deliverable in the contract. We took on a software project. Clear scope. Signed SOW. Milestone payments tied to specific features. The kind of setup you'd look at and think "this one's going to go smoothly." It didn't. First came the "small tweaks." Then two full pivots on the feature set. When the money dried up, the story changed. We went from "great partners" to "didn't deliver" overnight. A lawyer got involved. We talked to three attorneys. All three said we'd win. We settled for $1,500 anyway. Why? Because winning in court costs more than $1,500 in the first week alone. And the settlement included a sentence every agency owner should memorize: "As an offer of settlement, without any admission of liability or wrongdoing." That one line ended the conversation, protected our reputation, and let us get back to work. Here's what I tell founders now. Your SOW needs to list exact deliverables and acceptance criteria. Not "build an app." Exact features. Numbered. If it's not in the document, it doesn't exist. Tie every payment to a deliverable sign-off. No sign-off, no next phase. This feels harsh until the first time it saves you. Cap your scope changes. We include two. After that, it's a new SOW with new pricing. Document everything — every email, every approval, every "can we just add this one thing real quick." Your paper trail is your entire defense. Qualify before you sign. A company still negotiating payment terms while you're drafting the SOW is a signal. Screen before you engage. Contracts protect you from bad-faith exits — not from clients who can't hold a direction. It's not the bad-faith clients who burn you. It's the ones who start with great intentions and no clarity on how to build a business around their idea. Those are the ones who change the story once the relationship gets hard. The client in this story showed the signs early. Four pivots before a dollar of revenue. Scope drift in week two. Not surprises — patterns. A client who can't hold a direction is a qualification problem, not a contract problem. Recognise those patterns before you sign. A client who pivots four times with no revenue will consume your bandwidth and at best leave you replacing them six months from now. That same energy spent on a funded, decisive client graduates you to better problems. Qualification is not just about protection. It is about building the client base you want to keep. Loyal. Focused. On a path to success. A cult of clients, not a revolving door of founders with ideas but no discipline to build a business around them. Protect yourself before the project starts. Be deliberate about who you are building toward. Who is the client you actually want to keep — and are you screening for them?