Client Commercial Docs

The best commercial documents are precise without being bloated. Every exclusion you write down is a future argument you prevent — a fact most freelancers learn the expensive way, by absorbing scope that was never priced. This skill produces four document types: proposals, statements of work, change orders, and standalone assumptions and exclusions addenda. Each one has a specific job and a structure designed to do that job without padding.

The proposal opens with an executive summary readable on its own, restates the brief in the client's own language to prove you listened, then leads with outcomes before features. The SOW is the operational document — more detailed, with numbered deliverables, explicit acceptance criteria, client responsibilities, and a change control section that exists specifically so you can point to it later. The change order is factual, not apologetic — the client requested extra work, you priced it, here is the new timeline. The assumptions document captures the dozens of implicit conditions that quietly determine whether the project stays profitable.

It also enforces a red-flag phrase swap. "Unlimited revisions" gets replaced with a defined number. "Best efforts" becomes a specified deliverable. "ASAP" becomes a date. "Ongoing support" becomes a defined window. "As discussed" gets replaced with the actual agreement quoted in writing. These swaps are the single most useful edit on most commercial documents — they protect both parties without making the language adversarial.

What it deliberately doesn't do: write legal contracts. That's a lawyer's job. This skill sits in the space between the conversation and the signature — the business documents that win work and protect it. It also won't bloat a £2K project with a 14-page SOW. A short, detailed email is the right answer for small work with existing clients, and the skill says so rather than over-engineering the deliverable to look professional.