An async client kickoff: a five-day website workflow
Run a five-day async website kickoff with clear questions, partial submissions, review checkpoints and a final handoff for a remote project.
An asynchronous kickoff can work well when the client and delivery team cannot easily share a meeting time. It still needs a sequence, a responsible owner and a way to resolve ambiguity. The five-day plan below is an illustrative workflow you can adapt, not a promise that every project will be ready in a week.
Before day one: define what the kickoff must resolve
Decide which inputs are essential for the first delivery stage. For a website redesign, these may include the audience, primary action, page list, approved brand assets and the person who consolidates feedback. Keep optional background questions separate from the items that determine whether work can begin.
Name one person on each side who maintains the current request list. Contributors can supply their own answers, but someone needs to resolve conflicting responses and communicate the final decision. A group email address is not an approval process by itself.
Use the eighteen-question redesign questionnaire as a starting point, then remove questions that do not apply. An async process depends on clear writing: explain the requested format, why the input matters and what a useful answer looks like.
Days one and two: collect the brief and available inputs
On day one, send the project overview and the current checklist. Explain the proposed timeline, response channel and review process. Ask the client to submit what is ready and identify what is blocked. Requiring a perfect submission before anything can be sent can hide useful progress.
On day two, review the first answers and file links. Check that the project team can open the files and that the answers actually resolve the question. A short acknowledgment is useful: it tells the client which items are accepted for the next stage and which still need attention.
Keep clarifications attached to the relevant item. If the homepage copy needs an approval, ask for that decision there rather than starting a separate conversation with no connection to the checklist. Gather’s paid client response links support submitting answers and file links, followed by your review; they do not automatically approve the material.
Scroll sideways to see all columns.
| Day | Main action | Output |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Send brief and requests | Shared understanding of required inputs |
| 2 | Review partial submissions | Specific gaps and corrections |
| 3 | Resolve decisions | Approved direction and owners |
| 4 | Check readiness | Confirmed inputs and exceptions |
| 5 | Send handoff | Next milestone and responsibilities |
Day three: resolve decisions that writing has not settled
Some ambiguity is easier to resolve in a short conversation. If stakeholders disagree about the audience, page list or launch priority, propose a focused call with a clear decision agenda. Async should reduce unnecessary meetings, not prevent the team from using a useful one.
Before the call or written decision, summarize the disagreement in neutral terms and present the available options. Afterward, record the selected outcome in the checklist or brief. The decision should be visible to contributors who could not attend and should supersede conflicting earlier comments.
The approver-mapping article helps identify who can make the decision. Be especially careful when a helpful contributor says “looks good” but another person controls final approval. A clear authority boundary is more valuable than collecting many informal confirmations.
Day four: inspect readiness and name the exceptions
Review the inputs against the first milestone, not against an abstract desire to have every possible detail. Confirm that the materials needed for the next stage are usable and that unresolved items will not silently block it. If a draft is being used provisionally, state what remains to be approved before publication.
An illustrative readiness note might say: “The page list and homepage copy are approved for design. The team photo is awaiting permission and will use a labeled placeholder in the first review. Hosting access remains with the client administrator and is required before implementation.” Each exception has a clear meaning and owner.
Use the kickoff readiness review to structure this check. If an essential input is missing, revise the milestone or narrow the work that can proceed. Do not report the kickoff complete simply because the five-day window has ended.
- Inputs ready for the next stage.
- Provisional materials and their approval limits.
- Blocking gaps, responsible people and dates.
- Any change to the delivery assumption.
Day five: hand off one current version of the plan
Send a concise handoff that links to the approved brief, content and asset locations. Name the next deliverable, the review date and the person who will consolidate feedback. Include the remaining exceptions so the delivery team does not have to reconstruct them from the week’s messages.
Ask the client to confirm any unresolved schedule assumption. If no response arrives, follow the agreed process rather than treating silence as approval to publish or expand the work. The handoff should make the next action clear even when someone joins the project after kickoff.
Start with Gather’s free kickoff checklist and reuse the client kickoff template. After the project, revise questions that caused repeated clarification. A good async process improves through the specific misunderstandings it reveals, not by adding more form fields every time something goes wrong.
