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Nsidibe Etim
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STAKEHOLDER ANALYSIS AND COMMUNICATION PLANNING:

IDENTIFY STAKEHOLDERS:

Identify stakeholders process is done to determine the people, groups, or organizations who are or might be
impacted by some aspect of our project.

Stakeholders include people who:

• Work on the project


• Provide people or resources for the project
• Have their routines disrupted by the project
• Monitor regulations, laws, and standards of practice at local, county, state, and federal levels
• Are direct users of the project outcomes (products or services)
• Are directly or indirectly affected (positively or negatively) by the project outcomes.

Another way to identify stakeholders is to determine whether they are internal to the organization performing the
project or external to it.

Project managers and project core teams (often in consultation with the project sponsor) can find possible project
stakeholders as part of a brainstorming technique.

Classic rules of brainstorming apply:

Step 1: Generate a long list of potential stakeholders in the first column of a chart (white board or flip chart) without
evaluating and analyzing them.

Step 2: Another suggestion is to be specific; identify stakeholders by name when possible.

For each potential stakeholder, list the various project processes and results in which they might have an interest.
Consider financial, legal, and emotional interests of potential stakeholders. The project charter can be useful here.
Many stakeholders have an interest in multiple aspects of a project. Once the stakeholders and their interests have
been listed, they may be combined into groups with the same interests.

Analyze Stakeholders:

Stakeholder analysis is a technique composed of gathering and evaluating information to determine whose interests
should be emphasized throughout the project.
Prioritize stakeholder:

The first part of stakeholder analysis is to prioritize the stakeholders. Prioritization is important because, on many
projects, there are too many stakeholders to spend a great deal of time with each. While it is important not to ignore
any stakeholder, it also makes sense to concentrate on those who can impact or influence project outcomes.

Stakeholders are frequently prioritized based upon level of:

1. Power—ability to get others to do something


2. Legitimacy—perception that their actions are appropriate
3. Urgency—time sensitivity and legitimacy of claim1

Some organizations use additional criteria such as interest, influence, and impact.

Some organizations only use two or three criteria; others may use up to six. Each chosen aspect can be rated on a
simple scale of 1 to 3, with 3 representing the highest priority.

For the first aspect, power, a stakeholder who could order the project shut down or changed in a major way would be
a 3, and a stakeholder who could not change the project much would be a 1.

The other aspects can be analyzed in a similar fashion. The scores from the criteria are added to determine a total
prioritization score.

By determining who the stakeholders and their wants, project managers can effectively:

• Set clear direction for further project planning, negotiating, and execution.
• Prioritize among competing objectives.
• Learn to recognize complex trade-offs and the consequences of each.
• Make and facilitate necessary decisions.
• Develop a shared sense of risk.
• Build strong relationships with their customers.
• Lead associates, customers, and suppliers with empowering style and principles.
• Serve as good stewards of the resources of both the parent and customer organizations.
• Develop a communication plan for stakeholders that is specific for stakeholder groups.

The project team should next select the top 10 to 15 stakeholders for emphasis in the remainder of their planning.

The stakeholders with the highest total scores are often considered to be key influencers for the project.

The project manager and the core team should also plan to periodically review this prioritized list of stakeholders, as
the relative importance may change as the project progresses, especially if the project goals are not clear at the
outset.

While from a practical standpoint, project managers need to be especially attentive to the top stakeholders, the
enlightened “management for stakeholders” approach also encourages project managers to ensure that interests of
all the stakeholders, including less powerful ones, are considered.

This approach of giving preference to the most important stakeholders while recognizing needs of all stakeholders
requires judgment, and the advice of the sponsor is often helpful. One additional consideration is that various
stakeholders often have competing or contrasting interests.
Another consideration is that each project was selected to support a specific business purpose, and that purpose
should help determine the relative importance of various stakeholders.

All stakeholders may not favor the project.

Example of stakeholders that will not favor the project:

• Competitors in the business,


• public interest groups,
• voluntary organizations that promote environmental sustainability, and,
• occasionally, a segment of end-users may oppose the project and its execution.

The project manager must identify stakeholders who do not favor the project and monitor their actions closely.

If the project team developed the stakeholder identification and prioritization matrix without their sponsor, now
would be a good time to share it with the sponsor to seek feedback. Chances are good the sponsor may suggest
changes before the team firms up the stakeholder management plan. Sponsors are especially useful in sorting out
conflicting priorities.

Typically, when a conflict exists, external (paying) customers and top management are considered to be highly
important stakeholders.

The project team primarily considers these top stakeholders while they:

• Develop a communications plan.


• Define the scope of the project.
• Identify threats and opportunities.
• Determine quality standards.
• Prioritize among cost, schedule, scope, and quality objectives.

Document Stakeholders:

The primary output of the “identify stakeholders” process is a stakeholder register.

The stakeholder register is a repository of information regarding all project stakeholders. Teams use it to develop
strategies to either capitalize upon stakeholder support or to mitigate the impact of their resistance. The stakeholder
register provides input to relationship building with various stakeholders and helps determine their requirements. In
turn, these requirements serve as the basis of developing the project scope. The stakeholder register is a living
document that changes as needed.

A stakeholder register often is in the format of a matrix.

The stakeholder register is wherein we begin to evaluate the interests of the different stakeholder groups. Sometimes
referred to as the WIIFT (what’s-in-it-for-them), this analysis can be used to help identify common areas of interest
between the groups, and what made this particular program complex was the absence of common ground.

Strategies would be sought to change positions or reduce the impact of the behaviors of some of the groups.

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