It is essential to have a philosophy that allows you to think about clients beyond the project if you want to establish lasting working relationships—in business and beyond. Built over many years of successes and failures, here are my 10 commandments of client management.

1. A mistake or two along the way is forgiven when you have a relationship with a client. We’ll start off with a bang and address the most important of the 10 commandments, since all others feed off of it. This is why someone can do 20 projects with a client and continually be on the thinnest of ice and someone else can do only a few projects with a client but be positioned much better for long-term survival.

2. When you open your mouth and speak to a client, if the best you can do is break even, think hard about what you are going to say. Whenever we speak, there are three possible outcomes: score points, lose points, or break even. When talking with clients, you may have a decent idea when your comment is going to score points. Likewise, you probably know what won’t bring a smile to your client’s face. It’s that huge expanse in the middle that is so open to interpretation. The more thought you give to comments that occupy this space, the better off you’ll be. The goal is to minimize this neutral territory, moving thoughts to one side or the other.

3. Stay two or three steps ahead of the client at all times. Anticipating what may happen before it happens adds a layer of quality to what you’re doing. This is everso-important for research projects, which are a mix of both art and science. Staying ahead of the game allows for the art to come into play—adding quality and new ideas. At the end of the day, the client will have greater confidence in you as the caretaker of their project, providing you with greater opportunities for additional projects down the road.

4. As a project director, you are an extension of the revenue generator. But you should always take ownership of the project you are working on. Project directors are usually second in command and may even be the research supplier’s primary voice, but they are not responsible for generating revenue. As such, it would be very easy for project directors to perform according to their secondary role on a project. Project directors need to know that their behavior with clients is every bit as important as the behavior exhibited by revenue generators themselves. As a project director, if you truly believe the outcome of the research engagement rests on your shoulders, the client will have the greatest opportunity to experience a successful research effort. The bottom line is that both the revenue generator and the project director need to own the project.

5. Never wait for a client to do anything! Let’s say a client has signed off on a project schedule that indicates you will send the first draft of the survey on Monday and will get comments back no later than 5 p.m. on Wednesday. As Wednesday afternoon approaches with no communication from the client, you can either assume the comments will arrive by 5 p.m. or you can reach out to the client and ask if any clarification is needed. Of course, the real purpose of the communication is to remind the client of the deadline. When almost all project mistakes rest on your shoulders, never wait for a client to do anything.

Questions

1. Is it important to get face time with the client? Can’t you just rely on telephone calls, texts, e-mails and other forms of non–face-to-face communications? Why do you say that?

2. Can you rely totally on verbal communications with clients on key project issues? Why or why not?

3. Can you sit back and wait for clients to do things they are supposed to do? Justify your response.