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A quick technique for stakeholder analysis
April 25th, 2005
It’s not enough to simply know who your stakeholders are. Different players in the project landscape have very different interests in the outcome, and these can change over time. If not all stakeholders are equal, that implies that you need to tailor your approach to them. The question then becomes “how” should an approach be tailored, and “who” should get which approach?
While it might be desirable to deal with every single stakeholder with a personalised approach, in reality that’s unlikely to be possible. So here’s a technique for classifying stakeholders according to their power and influence, and their interest in the outcome.
Power and influence is a measure of how easy it would be for that stakeholder to affect the course or outcome of the project. There are obvious sources of power and influence such as holding the budget, but there are also more subtle ones - is this stakeholder a thought leader in their field, for example?
Stake in the outcome is a measure of how greatly they will be affected by the success - or otherwise - of the project. It could be that they will be direct beneficiaries of a new product or service, or that they will benefit in a more intangible way. And bear in mind that it’s possible to have a negative interest in the outcome - not everyone will necessarily want your project to succeed, for a whole variety of reasons.
By analysing the great mass of stakeholders in this way, it becomes possible to deal with them on terms which are much closer to their own.
Stakeholders with high power and influence, and a high stake in the outcome, are PLAYERS. They are able to shape the eventual outcome, as well as being affected by it. The approach here is one of “managed interaction” - to ensure that you maintain a dialogue with them in order to maximise your chances of getting them to influence the project in your direction.
High power and influence and a low stake in the outcome produces CONTEXT-SETTERS, or LOOSE CANNONS as they sometimes become. Often press and media fall into this category - their involvement can radically shape the progress of the project, but they have little or nothing at stake in the outcome. Here you’ll need a policy of INFLUENCE - trying to ensure that if they do intervene, it’s on your terms and favourable to you.
Stakeholders with low power and influence, but a high stake in the outcome are VICTIMS - they’re going to be affected by whatever happens, but they’re relatively powerless to control what that whatever turns out to be. There’s a cynical view that says these stakeholders can be ignored, but in reality you’re probably in a position where you’ll need to MEET YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES towards them.
Those with low power and influence, and a low stake in the outcome, are BYSTANDERS. You probably don’t need to interact with them particularly, but you do need to MONITOR them - for the reasons outlined below.
What’s important to bear in mind when using this technique is that stakeholders tend not to remain static for long - they will move around the quadrants based on their role in the project, and the project’s lifecycle. So it’s important not to overlook the bystanders - as they’ve got the potential to become players over time - and also to revisit this at various points during the project lifecycle so that you’ll catch the movement as it happens.
Filed under Project Management, Working smarter |3 Responses to “A quick technique for stakeholder analysis”
There’s another dimension to this: attitude to the project/the delivery team (ie you and your people).
Another other useful question to work through: where do you want/need each stakeholder to be? And how can you help them move to the desired location? In the 2 dimensions above, you often find that extreme context setters are often a risk to the project through being a loose cannon, and you need to make them less so, by working on either dimension (or both at a stretch). This may involve reducing a stakeholder’s influence on the project… which is never going to be fun.
That’s an interesting dimension to add in to the equation - I suppose it could be subsumed into the ‘power & influence’ axis, but considering it as a discrete variable would mean having to focus specifically on their attitudes, and take them into account.
It’s a very different axis - consider an influence/attitude 9-box matrix. Those with high influence need to be at least neutral. If not, you need to develop strategies to move them there. Those with low influence, not so much.
It lets you work out where best to spend your stakeholder management effort.