Have you ever signed a contract or service agreement without reading it? Yeah, us too. Not for the really important stuff, but I just did for my iPhone and PS4. Who has the time to read all that legal mumbo jumbo, with all those sentences that take three tries to process (and still sometimes manage to elude understanding)?
But sometimes a “skim and sign” won’t do. When we onboard new team members, we want them to kick off our working relationship by actually reading our service agreement from start to finish. The MSA outlines our expectations for them and explains what they can expect from us. Pretty important stuff. That’s why we’ve written our contractor MSA in plain, human language, using words that don’t require you to have a law degree to understand.
We aren’t lawyers, and we can’t provide legal advice. Our MSA has been reviewed by a number of different lawyers over the years, but it has never been tested in court—which is obviously good news for us. We see this contract first and foremost as a way of creating mutual understanding for our working relationship together, so we aim to articulate expectations in language that is meaningful to our contractors. That being said, lawyers prefer the tried-and-true legal mumbo jumbo. So talk to yours if you’re unsure whether our MSA is a good fit for your needs.
Here’s what’s in our MSA:
- Who we are
- Who you are
- Your responsibilities
- Our responsibilities
- You are your own boss
- You are a good person
- We will pay you
- You will keep all confidential info secret
- You respect copyright
- We own the results
- Bragging rights
- Say “cheese!”
- Stay safe
- This is not all or nothing
- If things go wrong
- If things go really wrong
- Sometimes things change
- This is just for you
- This is our foundation
- When everything is said and done
- Read this contract (duh)
If you work with independent contractors, freelancers, or small vendors on a regular basis, go ahead and make a copy of this template. It’ll give you a nice plain-language foundation that you can adapt and use in whatever way makes sense for your business.