I can't help it.  I'm going to start spewing out blog after blog.  But that's the point right?

 

I HIGHLY recommend thinking about where and when you will be proposing UI designs to clients. 

 

Should you pitch some kind of White-Board to identify a deliverable?  Absolutely.

 

Should you work on your UI before you finish your data and business logic? No way.

 

The problems you run into, are pretty simple when you think about.  We are all humans.  That is a fact.  And humans don't always want to know what the other humans know.  So they create an alternate reality.  As in "I know Accounting refers to this as a 'Site', but we refer to it as a 'Location'".

 

Easy enough you say.  My client can call it whatever they want if it fits their needs.  Ahh, how sweet that would be if it were that easy.

 

The problem is that client most likely refers to alot of "Things" and processes differently.  And if you massage their UI before you wrap up their data, you run the risk of either mucking up your deliverable, or not meeting their expectations.

 

Be realistic.  Start with what you have and build away.  At the end of the first iteration, make your tweaks and document.  Then, make your second pass.  BUT KEEP YOUR DATA CORRECT!

 

This may sound trivial, but it saves expensive consulting hours and makes everybody happy.