The PM Agenda
Execution is communication to the stakeholders
The stakeholders can be the cheerleaders of the strategy and the chief change agent.
Pick the stakeholders / Pick the messages / get the cadence right
Who are the stakeholders I need to talk about?
How to identify and research stakeholders:
- Who has approval rights to areas of your project
- Brainstorm with the team to find all potential stakeholders
- Interview know stakeholders
- Workshops to discuss needs and requirements
- Organizational chart creation or review
- Process modeling
- Scope modeling (boundaries: who does not belong on this project)
- RACI Matrix/Chart (Responsible/Accountable/Consulted/Informed)
- Understand their level of influence
- Stakeholder Grid (Influence vs Impact/High vs Low)
- Onion Diagram (center > outer rings of stakeholders)
- Surveys and Questenairs
Types of stakeholders
- Internal or external
- internal to the organization
- external to the organization.
- Primary or secondary
- Primary as a direct effect or affected by the outcome (highest level of interest)
- Secondary: generally contributes to the project
- Direct or indirect
- Direct means involvement with daily project activities like workers
- Indirect focuses on the output of the project rather than the tasks to complete the project.
- Pricing
- UI/UX
- Product/Application availability
Common Types of Stakeholders (*key stakeholders)
- Customers*
- Employees*
- Communities
- Owners
- Investors*
- Creditors
- Suppliers*
- Trade Unions (external, secondary, and indirect stakeholders)
- Government Agencies (external, secondary, and indirect stakeholders)
- Media/Social Media
For each stakeholder, what is the right message?
- Co-creating the right messages with key talent leaders
- Translate the messages into front-line routines and behaviors
- Tempo/Speed of messages and speed of executing decisions
- Cyclical companies benefit from a strong relationship with the chairman
What is the right cadence of delivery to the stakeholders? (once a month or once a week)
RACI Matrix Template
| Person | [Stakeholder] | [Stakeholder] | [Stakeholder] | [Stakeholder] | [Stakeholder] |
Deliverable | |||||
| Deliverable 1: | R | A | R | I | C |
| Deliverable 2: | I | R | |||
| Deliverable 3: | A | ||||
| Deliverable 4: | |||||
| Deliverable 5: |
| Code | Stands for | This is the person who …. |
| R | Responsible | Is the primary Subject Matter Expert (SME) who will take responsibility for ensuring that the requirements are expressed correctly. |
| A | Accountable | Makes the final decision or approves the specifications. |
| C | Consult | Provides the requirements. These SMEs can be consulted by the business analyst or the responsible SME. |
| I | Inform | Is informed after the final decision is made and can include stakeholders such as designers, testers, project steering committee, etc. |
Stakeholder Engagement (Manage expectations)
Identify > Analyze > Plan > Act > Review
Create a collaboration plan
Timing and cadence
location of meeting
list WIIFM list benefits
What methodology is used by the org
Review lessons learned
Manage Issues – Resolution
Communicate upcoming changes
Check the level of stakeholder engagement
- are they communicating with me?
- are they attending your meetings?
- are they providing support?