Who is the client? That used to be an easy question to answer but lately the term “client” is applied to many different groups.

Internal and External Clients

I.T. people refer to the users of the systems that they support as clients. These users are known as internal clients because both the I.T. team and the users are all employed by the same company.

That company may refer to the people who buy their goods or services as clients and these would be external clients.

Your team may be composed of employees of your own company who are performing a job for your company. Your client would be the management team of that company.

If you are working for a vendor that has been hired by a company then your client is the management team of the company which hired yours.

The real point is that ultimately the client is whoever is signing the checks and paying for the project, or in other words; the final end user.

Understanding the Client’s Expectations

There are always multiple levels of expectations whenever a project is underway. Working from the top down there’s the ultimate expectation that the project is going to be delivered on time, within budget and according to the overall project plan.

The client also expects that the most current methodologies and best practices will be applied and that each team member is fully qualified to perform their assigned tasks.

These major expectations are all dependent upon a series of minor ones which are not usually even mentioned but, nonetheless, are fully expected.

The client expects that:

• Everyone will show up on time
• Team conflicts will be resolved
• Company Policies will be adhered to
• Chains of Command will be respected
• Team Members will be committed and loyal

There are a host of other social and professional expectations that simply go without saying.

Most of these expectations will be met automatically since professionals tend to act professionally. However, there are occasions when accidental conflicts will occur. Regardless of your personal feelings, the Client, whether they are internal or external, has a right to have these expectations met. Here’s an example:

I once led a project team for an external client. Our company had a strict professional dress code but the client had a “Casual Friday” code. After the first few weeks I decided to allow the team to participate in the Friday dress-down to add a little fun to the project. I passed out a copy of the client’s written casual dress code so everyone on my team would know the boundaries.

In spite of my efforts a team member came in wearing a T-Shirt from a rock band. It had a very elaborate design on the back and, at first, there didn’t seem to be a problem. As it turns out there was an offensive symbol woven into the design which one of the client’s employees noticed and reported to his supervisor. I was asked to send the employee home to change immediately.

When I approached the team member he instantly understood the problem. He said that he didn’t even give the shirt a thought when he put it on that day. That hated symbol did not reflect his personal feelings but he understood that someone else could be offended.

The only issue was that he lived about 40 miles away from the project and sending him home to change would use up a chunk of the day. Fortunately I had one of our own company’s golf shirts in my car which I let him use. Problem solved.

Nowhere in the client’s dress code was there a prohibition that specifically mentioned this symbol, but there was a clause which said that no clothing which depicted offensive, immoral, illegal or lewd subjects would be permitted. That covered this situation as far as I was concerned.

There is usually no room to discuss these types of minor expectations that are procedural or generally accepted professional or social requirements. The client has a right to control the work environment in any way that they see fit as long as no laws are broken in the process.

But what about situations where the client is clearly in error, or when their expectations conflict with the project plan or the success of the project overall?

Here is an example of what I mean:

On another project that I managed, the President of the client’s company had a degree in Computer Science. This was a software development and implementation project and it was the first multi-million dollar project that the client had ever undertaken.

In the beginning, the President met with me daily, sometimes multiple times a day, to get status reports. As time went by he began approaching team members directly to get reports from them. Eventually he started taking them into his office to discuss “minor feature changes”. He would also stand behind the backs of programmers while they were coding and make “suggestions”. I was losing control of the project and my team was starting to show the stress of being micro-managed by the client.

We held a team meeting where I reviewed the “change order” clause of our contract with the client. I instructed each team member to respond to the client’s “suggestions” with words to the effect of:

“I think we should call the Project Manager in to make sure that this won’t result in a billable change order.”

Or “We need to consult with the Project Manager to make sure that this won’t affect other project milestones and cause you to be billed for additional time.”

I also notified my supervisor of the problem. He set up a meeting with the client’s CIO who was not only very understanding but he revealed that this was a very common problem with this President.

Finally the CIO, my supervisor and I had a face to face meeting with the President and the situation was resolved. The President agreed to work solely through me, put requested changes in writing and he agreed to be responsible for additional billing if change orders were required.

While none of this made my life any easier it took all the pressure off of the team which was my main goal. In fact, removing obstacles and making it as easy as possible for the project team to do its work should be the first goal of any good Project Manager.

There will be times when you will have a client who has either unreasonable expectations or who threatens the success of the project in some way. These situations are best handled by the PM. Business politics can be a dangerous minefield and there is no reason to put yourself at risk navigating it.