There are many projects that can involve an interior decorator. Before hiring one, you must familiarize yourself with the professional though. Besides, it is possible the project can last as many as 8 months but it can also last a few weeks. Therefore, better ask these few questions before deciding which interior decorator to hire:
What do you find most challenging?
You’re going to get to the bottom of the interior decorator’s personality. It won’t be bad to find out what the person hates. Besides, you’re just going to be in a professional relationship with the person so might as well get to know him better. Once you know what the interior decorator finds challenging, you can go ahead and avoid that for the rest of the task. After all, the last thing you would want is to get this person frustrated.
Are you open to suggestions?
There are interior decorators who would be open to client suggestions as the project goes on. However, there are also those people who would rather do the task without the client getting involved. It really depends on what you want to happen. If you trust the professional enough, you can choose to not interrupt during the project. However, if you really care about the final product then you’re going to give a lot of input.
What’s our mode of communication?
If their answer to the previous question is yes, then you must know how you will communicate with the person. It would be best if the person can communicate via text since it is the fastest. There are decorators who prefer to communicate via email though since they did it a long time ago.
However, you can’t rely upon that they will reply right away when it is via email. They will most likely reply at the end of each day which is not bad considering you’re not supposed to be in any hurry anyway. Communicating via Whatsapp won’t be so bad either as long as both of you have access to the Internet all the time.
How do you budget?
This question pretty much varies per person. Besides, all interior decorators prioritize different things when they work. There are those professionals who put paintings first while there are those who put furniture first in the budget. It really depends on where you want the project to be focused on. You should move on from interior decorators who prioritize the wrong thing.
What did you learn from your past mistakes?
This is one of those normal HR questions and it is still a great idea to ask this to the decorator. Besides, you would want to know how they would handle difficult situations. For example, the professional could have just given up on the situation but she chose to handle it differently and move on. Besides, you are going to encounter the same things in these situations. Thus, it is possible they would encounter similar things so you would want to know how they would handle it.
How do you choose projects?
This would help you determine whether or not the project would be a good fit for the interior decorator. It is understandable that they always get lots of projects they could tackle. However, they could only choose some since it would be impossible to take on all those things at the same time. Thus, they could look at several factors including scope and location that would help them decide. Yes, choosing a professional located near you would work in your favor a lot.
Now that you know what you must ask the interior decorator, you must look forward to hiring the best person for the job. It is alright to sit down with many interior decorators as long as you hire the right one. You would not want to waste your time dealing with the wrong person. Yes, this is one time when you must be patient because a lot of things will transpire during the project.
Thus, no matter who you hire you can’t expect this to be over in just a few days. The last thing you must do is to keep everything in writing so all the terms would work in both party’s favor.