Stakeholder Analysis

Purpose

In every project, there are more players than simply the buyer and the seller. Virtually all parties in the project environment have allies and foes. They have myriad “others” who take on some responsibility for the outcome of the project—either favorable or unfavorable. Because any one of these players has the potential to do harm to the project, communications at some level becomes essential for each and every stakeholder, but to communicate with them, you have to know who they are.

The basic premise of stakeholder analysis is one of identifying all of the key players in the project and their relative stakes. Who has something to win or lose because of this project? What are they passionate about? What don’t they care about? Those are the rudimentary and essential questions that need to be asked of each and every stakeholder. Because projects affect change in organizations, they drive passions. People care about their outcome. As a result, they have stakes. The customer normally has a stake in improving performance or enhancing the organization’s posture. The seller normally has a stake in making a profit. Individual team members’ stakes may range from opportunities to deploy their skills in a challenging environment to simply marking time until they reach retirement. The difference in those stakes may drive radically different communications’ needs.

Some stakeholders will want to have regular involvement in the project, with regular updates and frequent assessments of their roles and responsibilities. Others will strive to minimize their commitments, limiting the amount of project contact to the occasional e-mail update or briefing. Because of the nature of these differences, conducting a thorough stakeholder analysis is vital.

Application

The stakeholder analysis is normally conducted by interviewing key stakeholders or conducting an e-mail survey to determine their potential role in the project, levels of interest, and potential issues they may have with the project, its deliverables or its implementation. It can take a variety of forms, but is generally documented as a precursor to the communications plan to ensure that the needs of the stakeholders will be addressed.

The form for a stakeholder analysis is normally built in a tabular format with columns delineating (at a minimum) the stakeholder names, organization, needs, and expectations. Other columns may include time frame for participation, concerns, metric assessment of the level of participation, metric assessment of the level of influence, and resources the stakeholder may be able to engage in the project. Some suggest that the stakeholder analysis should be classified according to the resources they control.

Content

The source for the content in this form is a blend of experience and an environmental assessment of who will participate in the project. Because the project manager or individual completing the form may have information gaps in that regard, interviews are among the most common means for extracting this information from others in the organization. Other means for data extraction include focus groups, e-mail surveys, or telephone solicitations. The project manager should ask these initial interviewees: “Who has a stake in the project’s success or failure? Who should I concern myself with in assessing our approach?”

Once the initial list of potential participants has been identified, a separate round of interviews (with those individuals identified by the first group) should be conducted to complete the form.

Approaches

There are myriad ways to gather stakeholder information, but the most common approach is the face-to-face or telephone interview. A caveat in gathering information on stakeholders and stakes is that it is very easy for the interviewer to stray into requirements gathering or organizational concerns and to lose focus on the stakeholder and his or her stakes. The interview should consist of a strict effort to gather the data specifically identified on the form, radically limiting the duration of the interviews. Because a single project may have dozens or even hundreds of stakeholders, some stakeholder groups may need to be represented by a single individual.

Stakeholder analyses may also be conducted using survey forms to draw out the information. While this approach is more time effective, fewer than 100% of the intended respondents will normally respond. This may force the project manager to do extensive follow-up to ensure that the proper constituencies are identified and represented in the analysis.

Considerations

Some stakeholders may deny or minimize their stake in the project. They may not see themselves as critical to the project’s success or may not perceive their role as significant. That perspective can be overcome by limiting the duration of the interview to just a few minutes and by identifying the information sought before the interview occurs. Some people interpret stakeholder analysis to be more involved than it actually is.

During the life cycle of a project, the stakeholders may change as well. New participants enter and leave the project environment, and new issues and concerns create new stakes. The stakeholder analysis should be updated whenever there is a significant shift in project direction or in the makeup of the project team (both internal and external).