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Communication is around 80% of my job. Although I don’t claim to be able to do everything perfectly every time, I have developed a few solid methods that work in almost all situations over the years.
Today, I will share with you how I communicate in project management. These are my tips and tricks for communicating with my customers and stakeholders.
This article:
The tools I use
Email is another option.
Collaboration tools
Communication of project status
Software for project reporting
Problem solving
The flaws
Next steps

The tools I use
For my personal note-taking, I rely heavily upon paper and pens. I am a writer. I keep a notebook for my daily tasks and a planner for my big picture planning.
I even have pens that are specially made for special occasions.
This influences how I communicate with clients and how I work with them. Over the holidays, I sent out a lot of handwritten cards.
Two of them returned ‘addressee unknown’ because I had relied online on their company details – rookie mistake! Even corporate websites can be updated from time to time, or other offices don’t have the addresses. Doh.
I also send digital holiday greeting cards to clients, suppliers, and stakeholders. Would you like to do the exact same? Get the holiday cards that I use.
Email is another option.
I send many emails. This is partly because many of my clients live in the U.S., which means that I am at my desk before they are even awake. I do love email.
I have an inbox for each client or project depending on what type of work it is. This makes it easy to file away. The search functionality is a great help.
Because it’s more friendly and collaborative, I’m trying to do more work via Skype or the telephone.
Collaboration tools
You would expect that my software for stakeholder communication would be used every day, considering I wrote the book on Collaboration Tools For Project Managers.
Collaboration Tools for Project ManagersIt’s now that project teams can explore how online collaboration tools could help them communicate faster, collaborate virtually with people around the world, and achieve better business results.
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Although collaboration tools are great for sharing status updates, working together, and other tasks, there are better and more targeted ways to communicate things that aren’t action-driven.
Slack is a great tool for project management. I use it daily to keep in touch with my team. We have two channels, one called random and one called social. This channel is used for team building and general work stuff.
Collaboration Tools for Project ManagersIt’s now that project teams can explore how online collaboration tools could help them communicate faster, collaborate virtually with people around the world, and achieve better business results.
Buy NowWe earn a commission when you click this link and make an order.
To share the project status with stakeholders, I use a variety methods. It is important to tailor your communication to the needs of the people who receive it.
My immediate team will have more details and we’ll discuss the project in the jargon. This makes sense to us. We need to receive regular status updates from each of our colleagues to keep the project moving forward.
Senior managers and executives wouldn’t understand information at this level. They require a different level information, sometimes just as detailed, but with a different focus.
I spend a lot of time removing jargon and updating the information to reflect the needs of senior leaders.
I use email, Word documents and spreadsheets as tools.