diff --git a/CONTRIBUTING.md b/CONTRIBUTING.md
index 9b0209b..487f76b 100644
--- a/CONTRIBUTING.md
+++ b/CONTRIBUTING.md
@@ -21,4 +21,6 @@ Contributions will be accepted to the [dev](https://github.com/Netflix/fast_json
 
     e. Done :)
 
+3. Run the tests. We only take pull requests with passing tests, and it's great to know that you have a clean slate
+
 For minor fixes just open a pull request to the [dev]( https://github.com/Netflix/fast_jsonapi/tree/dev ) branch on Github.
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index d6dfa89..e19ba83 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -178,6 +178,7 @@ serializer | Set custom Serializer for a relationship | ```has_many :actors, ser
 
 ## Contributing
 
+Please follow the steps on [contribution checklist](https://github.com/Netflix/fast_jsonapi/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md).
 This gem is built using a gem building gem called [juwelier](https://github.com/flajann2/juwelier).
 
 Beyond just editing source code, you’ll be interacting with the gem using rake a lot. To see all the tasks available with a brief description, you can run: