I'm an engineer, but my previous boss was a project manager and I learned a lot about business communication and project ownership from him. I was at a small, non-tech company and I was frequently the point of contact with clients (aka colleagues on other teams), and my boss and I chatted about project management situations and he helped me navigate a few tricky scenarios (i.e. with difficult colleagues) a few times.

I have a Google Doc of a list of talks that I've had with him (and some other people at my company) in which I learned something.

Here's a few examples:

---

Me: Suppose the client did have a request that was impossible to do. How do you approach situations like that and give them an answer that doesn't make it seem like you're BS-ing them?

S: Something along the lines of: 'Due to the way the system is currently built, it may not be possible to fulfill your request exactly as your proposed. Just to be sure, I’ll take this back to our tech team (Adam/Bob/Chris) to see if there is a possibility to implement the changes or explore other alternatives and options. I'll follow up with our findings once we have our discussions.'

  - Never tell the client "no." If you do, they can easily go to another person/team.

  - Clients like hearing "I'll take this back to our tech team", because you're saying that you have 'better/more knowledgable' resources you can turn to.

---

  Scenario A:

Client: There's no rush.

(later on)

Client: Where's X? Why isn't it done?

(Instead, do this)

  Scenario B:

Client: There’s no rush.

Me: Did you have a due date in mind?

Client: I’m not sure.

Me: Okay, how does this date sound:

  - Setting a concrete date/range makes it so the client can't pull a "Why isn't X done" on you