Work Effectively With Stakeholders

- Working effectively with stakeholders
	- Project team roles and responsibilities
		- Choosing a project team
			- Required roles
			- Team size
			- Necessary skills
			- Availability
			- Motivation
		- Defining project roles
			- Project sponsors
			- Team members
			- Customers / Users
			- Stakeholders
			- Project manager
		- Evaluate stakeholders with stakeholder analysis 
			- power grid visualization
		- Assign project team roles and responsibilities with RACI chart
			- Responsible
			- Accountable
			- Consulted
			- Informed

Stakeholders: People who are insterested in and affected by the project’s completion and success

Exploring Project Team Roles and Responsibilities

Accessibility for project managers

Accessibility: Actively removing any barriers that might prevent persons with disabilities from being able to access technology, information, or experiences, and leveling in the playing field so everyone has an equal chance of enjoying life and being successful.

Choosing a project team

When identifying people resources, we need to carefully consider the project needs and use that info to guide our decision-making

Defining project roles

Clearly laying out the responsibilities for each role helps everyone know what project tasks they’re accountable for.

Project roles we always have

Evaluating Stakeholders

Completing a stakeholder analysis

Stakeholder analysis: a visual representation of all the stakeholders.

• It helps you avoid surprises, build necessary partnerships, and ensure you’re involving the right people at the right time.
• It helps you see all the opportunities for success and the potential risks.
• It illustrates which stakeholders are taking on which responsibilities, which can help you include the right people in important conversations and get support you need throughout the project.

Keys to kick off a stakeholder analysis

• Make a list of all the stakeholders the project impacts
• Determine the level of interest and influence for each stakeholder
  • Influence: measures how much power a stakeholder has and how much the stakeholder’s actions affect the project outcome
  • Interest: How much are the needs of the stakeholder affected by the project operations and outcomes
• Assess stakeholders’ ability to participate and then find ways to involve them

Key steps of stakeholder analysis

1. Make a list of all the stakeholders the project impacts.
   • Ask yourself: Who is invested in the project? Who is impacted by this project? Who contributes to this project?
2. Determine the level of interest and influence for each stakeholder
   • The higher the level of interest and influence, the more important it will be to prioritize their needs throughout the project.
3. Assess stakeholders’ ability to participate and then find ways to involve them.
   • Active stakeholders: with more opinions and touchpoints
   • Passive stakeholders: prefer only high-level updates and not involved in the day-to-day.

Techniques for managing stakeholders

Visualize the stakeholder analysis with a power grid:

• Key players/stakeholders (top-right): closely partner with them to reach the desired outcomes

  • Have a significant influence on the project and are highly interested in its outcome
  • Can greatly impact project decisions and success.
  • Examples: project sponsors, key executives, or regulatory authorities.
  • Resposes for this quadrant
    • Engagement and Involvement:
      • Keep these stakeholders well-informed and engaged throughout the project lifecycle.
      • Involve them in decision-making processes, seeking their input and feedback.
      • Address their concerns promptly and effectively.
    • Regular Communication:
      • Schedule regular meetings or updates to keep them informed about project progress and any issues.
      • Tailor communication to their preferences and needs to ensure they remain supportive and engaged.

• Stakeholders with higher influence but lower interest (top-left)

  • Consult with them and meet their needs. Their opinions and input are important to the project. (e.g., The Director of Product has high influence, but may not be vested into day-to-day activities, and therefore will have a lower interest. )
  • Responses for this quadrant
    1. Executive Summaries:
       • Provide high-level summaries of project progress and key decisions for their review.
       • Focus on the impact of the project on organizational goals and objectives.
    2. Periodic Updates:
       • Provide periodic briefings or updates to ensure they are informed of major milestones and critical project changes.

• Stakeholders with lower influence but high interest (bottom-right)

  • Show consideration for them by keeping them up-to-date on the project. It’s unlikely they’ll need a say in what’s going on, but keeping them informed is important.

    • For example, the customer success team may have lower influence but high interest since they’ll work directly with clients on the new product.

  • Responses for this quadrant

    1. Regular Updates:
       • Communicate project progress, risks, and updates to keep them engaged and informed.
       • Address their queries and concerns promptly to maintain their interest.
    2. Stakeholder Feedback:
       • Seek their feedback on project plans, progress, and outcomes to ensure their perspective is considered.

• Stakeholders with low influence and low interest (bottom-left)

  • Monitor them, keeping them in the know.
  • Responses for this quadrant
    1. General Communication:
       • Share general updates about the project’s overall progress without overwhelming them with details.
       • Address any specific questions they may have, but avoid unnecessary inundation with project-related information.
    2. Minimal Engagement:
       • Maintain a basic level of communication and engagement to keep them aware of the project without distracting them from their regular responsibilities.

At the start of the project, list the stakeholders and then place them into the appropriate places on the grid. -> Being able to visualize their placement will help you manage communications and expectations.

You may also want to create a steering committee made up of a high influence and high interest stakeholders.

• These people will be the most senior decision-making body on any project.
• They have the authority to make changes to budget and approve updates to timeline or scope.

Ways to involve each stakeholder

Be strategic to get helpful and relevant input from the right people at the right time

• Meet with some stakeholders every single day
• others you’ll just send periodic updates to

Stakeholder buy-in

Stakeholder buy-in: The process of involving these people in decision-making to hopefully reach a broader consensus on the organization’s future

To get stakeholders to buy-in on the project

• Clearly mapping the work of the project to the goals of the stakeholder

• Pay particular attention to your high-impact stakeholders and make sure they feel looped in

• Explain to them how the project will help them achieve their goals

• Have their support later on if any issues come up

• Listening to feedback from the stakeholder and finding ways to incorporate their feedback into the project’s charter where appropriate.

Important things to keep in mind when communicating with stakeholders

• If you have one main stakeholder, that stakeholder is likely to be highly influential and needs constant communication.
• If you’re on a larger project with numerous stakeholders, they won’t be quite as involved in the day-to-day tasks.
• For stakeholders who need time to make decisions about the project, over-communicate early on
  • E.g., hold frequent meetings and send daily end-of-day progress emails. -> This way, they have enough time to weigh the options and make decisions.
• Think about the level of project details each stakeholder needs. You don’t want to spend time diving deep with stakeholders that just need a project summary.

Assigning Project Team Roles and Responsibilities

RACI chart

A RACI chart can be an extremely effective way to define project roles, give direction to each team member and stakeholder, and ensure work gets done efficiently. Having a RACI chart available throughout the duration of your project as a quick visual can be invaluable.

RACI

• Responsible: Those doing the work to complete the task
• Accountable: Those making sure the work gets done
• Consulted: Those giving input or feedback (e.g., subject matter experts or decision makers)
• Informed: Those just needing to know the final decisions or that a task is done

Steps for creating a RACI chart

0. Write down each task or deliverable for your project, and assign it the appropriate role for each stakeholder.

1. Think about who’s involved in the project. Write the roles in a row across the top of the chart.

2. Write down the tasks or deliverables in a column on the left (not too specific here, keep the chart simple and easy to read)

3. Go through each task/deliverable and ask:

   • Who’s responsible for doing this?
   • Who’s accountable if it doesn’t get done?
   • Who will have strong opinions to add, and therefore, should be consulted about how this gets done?
   • Who needs to be informed of the progress or decisions made about this?

   Assign the letters R, A, C, and I based on your answers.

Building a RACI chart

Why Orojects Fail: Initiation Missteps

But despite your best efforts in project setup, projects can still fail. We will explore a few key reasons why projects fail and examine how missteps during the initiation phase can lead to project failure.

Unclear expectations

Not taking the time at the beginning of a project to ask essential questions, document decisions, and understand the true scope of the project may lead to failure. After all, without directions, you can never reach your destination.

Unrealistic expectations

We all like to impress our managers, but sometimes, we accidentally agree to unrealistic expectations and set our projects up for failure from the start. It’s important to understand the requirements of a project before agreeing to any deadlines.

As a best practice, don’t commit to firm dates when initiating the project to avoid setting unrealistic expectations. You will have more information and will be able to better manage expectations in the planning phase.

Miscommunication

If information is not communicated in a timely manner, does not include pertinent information (risks, decisions made, scope changes, etc.), or is not sent to the correct stakeholders, then you may be setting yourself up for failure. Conducting a stakeholder analysis and then utilizing a RACI chart to understand which stakeholders should be kept informed or consulted is a great start to creating an effective communication strategy.

As you are kicking off a project, make sure you take some time to understand the communication needs of your team and stakeholders. A strong communication system incorporates different methods (emails, phone conversation, etc.). Set expectations for your communication approach early so that you, your team members, and your stakeholders have a clear understanding of how you will all communicate.

Lack of resources

Resources include your team members, budget, and materials.

• Ensuring that the right team members are available at the right time is crucial.
• Another common error is to incorrectly calculate your project expenses.

Scope creep

The scope provides an overarching framework of what is and is not included in the project’s work and deliverables. Defining the scope in the initiation phase helps identify the resources needed, the cost associated with those resources, and the schedule required to complete the work. Sometimes projects fail because the scope of the project grows and impacts to the scope are not captured.

As a project manager, when deliverables change, you have to make sure that you are capturing the potential impact of those changes to the schedule, budget, and quality. This is why it is so important to make sure that everything is documented in the initiation phase. Have a plan for how to handle scope creep if it occurs, and clarify who has the authority to approve scope changes.