[Just for laughs] Because an ounce of prevention is worth a terabyte of tickets. This completely fake but painfully accurate client onboarding checklist highlights the madness you agree to support every time you sign a new contract.
Is your “Spidey Sense” telling you this new client might turn into a tech dumpster fire consuming the souls of your staff? Fear not! Your friends at ChannelPro are launching a new series of resources to keep you sane, profitable, and smiling.
Should you charge double for your services? Do you need to offer hazard pay to your help desk staff? Simply complete this onboarding checklist with your new client on Day 1 to see what you are in for.
Client Onboarding Checklist
General Info
☐ Have you ever yelled at a printer?
☐ Do you believe turning it off and back on is too technical?
☐ Do you or anyone in your company respond to emails from Nigerian princes or the “Romanian Lottery?”
☐ Is your CEO regularly surprised by the existence of two-factor authentication?
Password Practices
☐ Is your go-to password “password123?”
☐ Do you write down all your passwords and tape them to your monitor?
☐ Do you use the same password for your email, your bank, your fantasy football league, and your cat’s Instagram?
☐ Are you open to the idea of using a password manager (and by that we mean, not visibly panicking when we explain it)?
Device Usage
☐ Will you be using this workstation to mine Bitcoin or Dogecoin?
☐ Do you install toolbars voluntarily?
☐ Have you ever clicked on “Your computer has been infected, click here to clean it?”
☐ Do you believe all pop-ups should be obeyed?
☐ Are you planning to share this business laptop with your teenager who’s “really into torrenting?”
Email Behavior
☐ Do you click links from strangers with subject lines like “Urgent! Action Required Now!” and the like?
☐ Would you recognize a phishing attempt if it were wearing a trench coat and sunglasses?
☐ Do you forward suspicious emails to your entire company to see what they think?
☐ Do you consider unsubscribe buttons to be mystical symbols?
Operational Expectations
☐ Do you expect us to fix 12 years of bad IT decisions in the first week?
☐ When you say “the internet is broken,” can you describe what you mean?
☐ Do you still run software that was discontinued during the Bush administration (first or second)?
☐ Will your staff follow our advice, or just call their nephew in IT anyway?
Miscellaneous Red Flags
☐ Is your backup system a USB drive that lives in someone’s desk drawer?
☐ Have you hired us to “fix” a previous MSP’s solution without telling us what they did?
☐ Have you ever spilled coffee on a server and used a hairdryer to fix it?
☐ When asked if you have any documentation, did you respond with, “What’s that?”
How Did Your Client Do?
- Fewer than Four Boxes Checked: You might’ve finally found a unicorn. Proceed — but stay skeptical.
- Roughly Half of the Boxes Checked: Proceed with caution. Rather than a client, you’re likely onboarding drama.
- All Boxes Checked: Change your name. Move out of town. This client is a tech dumpster fire.
Life is too short to take tech too seriously. Remember: You can’t spell insanity without “IT.”
This article is intended for entertainment purposes only. Any resemblance to facts, reality, or good judgment is purely coincidental.
Featured image: iStock
