Clients and engagements

Keep client ownership, billing terms and engagement scope connected. Account Manager records the client name, industry, primary contact, billing terms and account owner. The owning organization identifies the business unit responsible for that relationship. A prospect becomes active when the account team is ready to start work.

• Client setup. Account Manager records the client name, industry, primary contact, billing terms and account owner. The owning organization identifies the business unit responsible for that relationship. A prospect becomes active when the account team is ready to start work.
• Engagement scope. For each engagement, the manager records the client, contract value, budget hours, delivery dates and engagement type. The engagement has its own status. A client can stay active while one engagement is proposed and another is completed.
• Handoff to delivery. The engagement manager checks that the organization, client and planned dates are right before marking the engagement active. Service lines, time, expenses and milestones then attach to that engagement.

The team can follow each decision through its source record. References connect work to the client engagement, while statuses keep the current queue readable. Review a record before changing its status so the next person can understand why it moved.

Decide who may change billing terms after delivery begins, which manager owns each active engagement and how an on hold client affects open work. Agree whether contract value is the agreed scope value or a working estimate. Keep record ownership clear when a colleague is away. Use the status lists during a pilot to make sure submitted items are visible to the person expected to act.

An IT services client agrees to a fixed fee network refresh. The account manager records the client and net payment terms, then proposes an engagement with a named manager, value, budget and dates. The manager confirms the scope and starts work. When engineers submit service lines, each line points to the same engagement. The director can compare delivery to the original value without confusing it with a second project for the same client. If the project is paused, the manager marks that engagement on hold and keeps the client relationship intact.

Before service starts, the manager opens the active engagement and checks its client, organization, dates and hours budget. The account manager checks the client terms and owner in Active Clients. If the network refresh scope changes, update the engagement itself so later service lines and milestones retain the right commercial context.

• Active Clients — Active customer accounts with their terms and assigned owner.
• Active Engagements — Delivery work with a client, manager and commercial baseline.

Follow the related process and review the data model when preparing a pilot.