The one-page brief

A project brief is one page that the sponsor, the budget owner and the expert sign and read the same way. Its job is agreement, not description: once it's signed, the team stops re-arguing the basics every week.

A useful brief answers seven questions: the goal and why now; success criteria in two parts; scope in and out; constraints; assumptions you can test; the owner and the sponsor; and how changes are decided. One page is a feature: anything longer is the plan, which comes later.

Danylo's recycled brief shows the typical gaps. Its “goal” is a list of outputs (40 lesson plans, a test, a page) with nothing about learners. Nothing is out, so every new request can claim a place. A team list names no owner and no sponsor. And “budget: to be agreed” gives Hanna no ceiling. A brief like that can be signed by everyone and still mean something different to each of them.

The real goal and the hard limits of a project rarely sit in the request. They sit with the people who will sign the brief, so ask each of them first, and ask what they need, not what they want built.

For the launch, three short conversations did the work. Leo, asked why now, gave the goal: last spring Klasna turned physics families away, and this time learners should study with Klasna before the exam peak. Hanna, the budget owner, gave a ceiling: 600,000 UAH for everything spent before opening, her own planning number. Vira, the expert, gave a quality bar: no opening with fewer than 8 tutors who passed a demo lesson she watched.

None of this was in “launch physics by 1 February”. Ask also about hidden limits: seasons, other teams' calendars, people's availability. Roman's note that strong candidates are free only evenings and weekends is exactly that kind of fact.

A fixed date is not a goal. It's a constraint and part of the delivery criterion. The goal is the reason the date exists.

“Open physics on 1 February” tells the team when; it doesn't say why. Leo's answer to “why now?” does: learners preparing for the physics exam study with Klasna this spring, before the peak, instead of being turned away as they were last spring. The date serves that goal: open later and the learners have already chosen someone else.

Keeping the two apart changes decisions. If the goal were just the date, opening on 1 February with three tutors would count as success. Because the goal is learners studying with Klasna, the brief checks it twice: delivery (open on 1 February with 8 demo-tested tutors, within 600,000 UAH) and result (120 physics packages bought by 28 February). In the brief, write the goal first, then the date as a limit it must respect.

Two kinds of brief lines look alike but need different handling.

A constraint is a known limit you plan inside: the 1 February date, Hanna's 600,000 UAH ceiling, and the fact Roman already knows, that strong candidates teach at school and are free only evenings and weekends. You don't test constraints; you design around them.

An assumption is something the plan treats as true that nobody has checked yet: that at least 8 qualified tutors accept 430 UAH per delivered lesson; that the current booking flow can sell a physics package without new code; that families who bought maths lessons will open an email about physics. Each could be false, and if it is, the plan breaks.

The danger is the unwritten assumption: it breaks a project quietly, in January, when there's no time left. So list assumptions separately in the brief, where everyone can see them, and give each a check.

An assumption is useful only if it can turn out false early. Write each one with three parts: a number, a check and a date.

“Tutors will accept the rate” can't fail until January. Rewritten: “At least 8 of the candidates who pass the demo lesson accept 430 UAH per delivered lesson; Roman checks with the first 15 by 6 November.” Danylo's becomes: “A physics package sells through the current booking flow; Danylo runs a test purchase by 16 October.”

If a test fails, you learn it in October or November, when it's just a plan change: raise the rate, add a booking task, ask Leo for a decision. Found in January, the same fact is a crisis. Vague assumptions such as “the market is ready” or “the page will convert well” feel safe precisely because nothing can disprove them, and that is the problem. If you can't name who checks it and by when, it isn't written yet.

Scope says what the project will deliver. The in list is the easy half: for physics, the exam curriculum and practice material, the diagnostic test, the landing page, tutor recruiting and demo lessons. The out list matters more, because every tempting extension named there is an argument you won't have in January.

Requests are already arriving: a physics simulator in the app, cheaper group classes from marketing, olympiad students Vira once mentioned. None of them is needed for the goal (exam learners studying this spring), and each would eat time before a fixed date. So they go on the out list, by name.

“Out” means not this project, not never. Write a few words on when or how each item could come back: group classes as a separate decision after the first month; olympiad preparation as a later program. That makes the out list easy to accept: nobody's idea is killed, it just isn't allowed to stretch this launch.

A brief names who decides what, so it stays an agreement after it's signed.

The project lead (you) runs the work and decides everything inside the brief. The project sponsor (Leo) signs the brief and is the only person who can move its edges: the date, the budget or the scope. Hanna owns the cash; Vira owns the quality bar.

Then a change rule in one line: changes to date, budget or scope go to Leo as a short written note, and he answers within two working days. When marketing asks in November to add group classes, which the brief lists as out, nobody votes and nobody quietly adds them: you write the note with the trade-off (what it would cost in days and money) and Leo decides. Hanna gets no surprise expenses in January.

Add the main risks in one line too (tutors found too late, Vira's review slipping, the page late), so the signers see them before they sign.

Put together, the physics brief fits on one page, and every line has a home:

• Goal and why now: physics exam learners study with Klasna this spring; last spring families were turned away.
• Success criteria: open on 1 February with 8 demo-tested tutors within 600,000 UAH (delivery); 120 packages bought by 28 February (result).
• Scope: in, and out by name (group classes, olympiad preparation, app changes).
• Constraints: the date, the ceiling, evening and weekend availability.
• Assumptions with a check and a date: 8 tutors accept 430 UAH, checked by 6 November.
• Owner and sponsor, and the change rule.

If it runs longer, you're writing the plan. If a line could sit under two headings, it's not clear yet.

How it fits together: the brief turns the project definition and the two-part success criteria into one signed agreement. The case lesson next has you write the whole physics brief yourself.