Responsiveness

In our industry there is no more important quality in a project manager than responsiveness. Clients will reach out to you by email or by phone, often at odd hours, seeking urgent assistance. Respond to their communications promptly. You will not be able to satisfy every request right away, but at least acknowledge that you have received the request and let the client know that you are working on it.

Remember that our clients work under intense pressure. You may be supporting a massive international review project where a kink in the pipeline can result in dozens of review attorneys sitting idle as costs mount. Or your client may be struggling against an impossible deadline during preparation for trial. Nothing induces panic in such situations more than sending out a call for help and not hearing anything in return. Again, let them know right away that you are on the case.

After you have consulted with Engineering, eZReview Support, or other resources to craft a solution, you may be able to get back to the client with a definitive time frame for implementation. This is not always the case. Some problems may resist our best efforts once, twice or even three times. Regardless of how long it takes us to solve them, however, your task as project manager is to maintain contact with the client, providing the most up-to-date information on where we stand.