The deal is signed and everyone is pleased. A few days later, the person doing the work calls the client to ask questions the client already answered twice during the sale. Nothing was lost on purpose. It simply stayed in the seller's head, inbox and notes, and the delivery work started from scratch.

A handoff fixes this with three things: a short brief, a rule about when a deal counts as won, and a checklist for the first week.

The handoff brief

Whoever sold the job writes this once. Five items are enough:

  1. What was promised, in the client's words where possible: scope, deliverables, any "yes, we can do that" said on a call.
  2. What was explicitly left out. This is the part that prevents arguments three weeks later.
  3. Dates and constraints: start date, deadline, access times, anything the client said cannot move.
  4. Who is who: the person who signs off, the person you deal with day to day, and anyone who must not be surprised.
  5. Money: price, payment terms, deposit, and whether it has been paid.

Keep it as a short template, so every brief has the same five headings and nothing depends on memory.

A deal is "won" only when the brief is complete

Make this the rule: a deal is not marked won until the brief is filled in. It sounds strict, but it moves the work to the one moment when the seller still remembers everything.

If your CRM can make fields required before a deal is closed, use that for the five items. If not, add "handoff brief done" as the last step before won.

A short handoff call

For larger jobs, the seller and the person delivering have a short call with the brief open. The question to ask is: "What will surprise the client if we don't know it?" For small, repeat jobs, the written brief is enough.

First-week checklist

Use this as a default and adjust it to your work:

  • Send the client a welcome email within a working day: who their contact is and what happens next.
  • Confirm the day-to-day contact and how they prefer to be reached.
  • Book the kick-off meeting or first visit.
  • Collect access, files or materials you need from the client.
  • Send or confirm the deposit invoice if one is due.
  • Set the date of the first milestone and tell the client.

Turn the list into tasks the moment the deal is won, so nobody has to remember to start it.

Where post-sale work should live

For a small team there are three sensible choices:

  • More stages after "Won" in the same pipeline. Fine for short jobs of a few days.
  • A separate board for delivery, with its own phases. Better for jobs that run for weeks.
  • A separate project tool. Only worth it if delivery is complex and the team already lives there; the risk is the handoff gap you started with.

Pick one and keep all post-sale work there.

Where Pipedrive fits

If you already sell in Pipedrive, its Projects feature starts delivery from the deal: when you mark a deal as won you can create a project from it, and projects have boards with phases, tasks, subtasks and milestones. Projects is included on the Premium plan and higher and is a paid per-user add-on on lower plans. Required fields are also a Premium feature. Its Projects documentation does not cover time tracking or invoicing, so those stay in the tools you use now.