How Quickly Will my Research be Completed

I recently had a discussion with another professional genealogist where we discussed time frames of client projects. No matter the length of time you contract your professional genealogist for, it might be important for you to know how long that might take. Being contracted for a certain number of hours does not mean that they will start work on the project and complete it within a day, two days, or even a month.

How Quickly Will my Research be Completed?

Here are eleven things that should be taken into consideration when you feel the project might be taking too long.

  1. How many other projects do they have?
  2. Are they active lecturers (which means an active schedule)?
  3. Availability of records needed?
  4. Will they need to use the snail mail to get records?
  5. Will they need another researcher to obtain records that they do not have access to (Perhaps out-of-state)?
  6. Is there travel needed (in or out-of-town)?
  7. Are there new records that are becoming available soon?
  8. They require time to write your research plan (to start) and then your final report (to finish).
  9. Are they working part-time or full-time?
  10. Life…sometimes family things do happen that can cause them to be behind schedule.
  11. Lack of information, or unclear information. (See yesterday’s post about what information you should share).

These are just a small sampling of things that can come into play when you hire a professional. Discuss that up front so you and your professional genealogist can come to an agreement on a timeline, if necessary.

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