The one-page brief that gets you a useful quote from any supplier

Three quotes that are impossible to compare usually means the brief was the problem. What to include, what to demand, and the signs of a supplier to avoid.

Why three quotes are impossible to compare

If you’ve ever asked three suppliers to quote on “sorting out our booking system” and received back three completely different documents — different structure, different assumptions, different things included and excluded — you already know the problem. It isn’t that the suppliers were dishonest. It’s that you gave them a problem shaped like a shrug, and three different people filled in the gaps three different ways.

A one-page brief fixes this. Not because it’s clever, but because it forces every supplier to respond to the same set of facts, which is the only way a comparison means anything.

Describe the problem, not the solution you’ve already guessed at

The single biggest mistake in a brief is writing it as a solution. “We need an automated CRM with a booking calendar” tells a supplier what you’ve decided, not what’s actually going wrong. It also locks you into your own guess before anyone with more experience has had a chance to point out a simpler fix.

Write the problem in business terms instead. “We lose track of enquiries when staff are on leave, and customers chase us for quotes we’ve already half-written.” That sentence lets a good supplier bring their own thinking. A brief written as a solution only tests whether someone can build the thing you imagined — not whether it’s the right thing.

Who it’s for, and how many of them

Say who will actually use this. Two office staff? Fifteen casual instructors logging in from their phones? A bookkeeper who touches it once a month? Numbers matter — a tool for two people and a tool for fifty behave completely differently, and a supplier needs to know which one they’re pricing.

What success looks like, in one measurable sentence

Not “make things easier.” Something you could actually check three months later: “every enquiry gets a first reply within one business day” or “invoices over thirty days old drop to close to zero.” If you can’t write this sentence yet, that’s worth knowing before you talk to anyone — it usually means the process itself needs writing down first.

What has to integrate with what

List every existing system this needs to talk to — your accounting software, your email platform, your booking calendar, a government portal, whatever it is. Suppliers who skip this question in their own discovery are telling you they haven’t thought about the hardest part of the job yet.

The hard constraints

Be upfront about the things that aren’t negotiable: a busy season nothing can touch, an existing system that has to keep running in parallel, a person or team that absolutely cannot be disrupted while this is being built, a deadline tied to something real like a grant reporting date or an enrolment period. Constraints aren’t a weakness to hide. They’re information a supplier needs to price the job honestly.

What’s explicitly out of scope

This is the line that saves the most arguments later. If you’re only fixing enquiry handling and not touching invoicing, say so in writing. Scope creep rarely starts as a dispute — it starts as an assumption nobody corrected.

What you need at handover

Decide now, not later, what you’re owed once the work is done:

• Plain-language documentation you could hand to a new staff member.
• Access to every account, password, and system involved — in your name, not theirs.
• Some form of training, even if it’s brief.
• An off switch — a clear way to pause or stop the automation without needing to call anyone.

Put this in the brief and every supplier has to answer it upfront, rather than you discovering the gaps after you’ve paid.

Questions to demand of every supplier

A brief invites answers, but you should also insist on answers to a few pointed questions, regardless of what they volunteer:

• What happens when it breaks — who do you call, and how fast do they answer?
• Who owns the accounts and the data once it’s built — you, or them?
• What does it cost to keep running, separate from what it cost to build?
• What happens if you want to leave — can you take your data and your workflows with you, or are you stuck?

Any supplier worth hiring will answer these plainly and without getting defensive. That reaction alone tells you a lot.

“What’s your budget?” is a fair question

Owners often treat this as a trap, as though naming a figure hands the supplier a licence to spend all of it. It isn’t a trap — it’s a legitimate question, because the right answer to “can we build this” genuinely depends on how much is available to spend, the same as it would for a renovation or a new piece of equipment. Refusing to answer doesn’t protect you; it just means you get quotes that are either wildly over what you’d ever consider or artificially thin in ways that surface later as extra charges.

Answer it with a range and a reason. “Somewhere in this range, because that’s roughly what we currently lose in staff time chasing this manually” is a genuinely useful answer. It’s specific enough to work with and honest about where the number came from.

Signs of a supplier to avoid

• They won’t put scope in writing — everything stays a verbal understanding.
• They quote a number before asking you a single real question about the problem.
• They keep the accounts and logins in their name, not yours, “to make it easier.”
• They can’t explain what they’re building in plain language — everything is jargon, or “trust the process.”

The one-page template

• The problem — in business terms, not solution terms.
• Who it’s for — roles, rough numbers, how they’ll access it.
• Success looks like — one measurable sentence.
• Must integrate with — every existing system involved.
• Hard constraints — timing, existing systems, people who can’t be disrupted.
• Out of scope — what this project is explicitly not fixing.
• At handover we need — documentation, access, training, an off switch.
• Budget — a range, and the reasoning behind it.

One page. Every supplier answers the same questions. Comparing them stops being guesswork.