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Insight #25 Stakeholder Management in Large Complex Programs – Step 2 - Stakeholder Mapping
Dar Al Riyadh Insights reflect the knowledge and experience of our Board, executives and staff in leading and providing PMC, design and construction management services. Dar Al Riyadh believes in the importance of broadly sharing knowledge with our clients and staff to improve project outcomes for the benefit of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
The key steps in the overall stakeholder management process are discussed in this series of Insights. These activities and their effectiveness can have as much to do with shaping overall program success as the “hard” engineering, procurement, and construction activities undertaken.
In this Insight, we describe the second of six steps for managing stakeholders in large complex programs.
Step 2 - Stakeholder Mapping
Having identified the universe of potential stakeholders in Step 1, the program manager must now seek to understand how these stakeholders may relate not only to the program but also to each other. Stakeholder groups with conflicting and complementary objectives must be understood. Stakeholders who provide tacit leadership or financial support to one or more of the stakeholder constituencies must also be recognized in order to design appropriate stakeholder messaging and engagement programs.
The construction of one or more relationship maps among the stakeholders identified during the stakeholder identification process provides an effective tool for understanding these inter-relationships. Typical relationship maps will address the owner’s organization; governmental agencies and authorities; financial and investor groups; and key external stakeholder groups. An example of one such relationship map is illustrated below.
A word of caution is in order. It is important to remember that “The map is not the territory.”
Other relationship mapping techniques exist and include:
- classification of stakeholders based on:
- power to influence
- stakeholder’s relationship with the program
- importance of their issues on to the program
- mapping stakeholder expectations based on:
- value hierarchies
- Key Results Areas (KRAs)
- ranking stakeholders based on:
- needs (vs. wants)
- importance to other stakeholders
- ranking stakeholders by their:
- threat potential
- potential for cooperation
Various graphical presentations have been developed and include two-dimensional n x n matrices such as the 2 x 2 influence-interest matrix shown below as well as three-dimensional models (power, interest, and attitude; Murray-Webster and Simon 2005) and radial models ( The Stakeholder Circle; Bourne 2007).
A third dimension may be introduced into the more traditional 2 x 2 matrix through color coding of stakeholders or variance of the circle sizes locating them in this 2 x 2 space.
Dimensions against which evaluation of stakeholders for purposes of mapping may incur can include:
- Interest (high, low)
- Influence (high, low)
- Power (high, medium, low)
- Support (positive, neutral, negative)
- Need (strong, medium, weak)