Stakeholders are those groups of people or institutions that have an interest in your company (of which you are not always aware). There are many general theories about stakeholder management and methods to implement. When dealing with change, a simple stakeholder “view” could help you control the change.
Such a sight will look like a spider. It shows the contexts of your organization (the core) and the legs of the spider point to the stakeholders. In the view below, the spider lost a leg:
- Clients (commercial clients or consumers)
- Competitors
- Employees (Management)
- Third parties (suppliers and business partners)
- Providers of capital, investors, shareholders
- Government (local, national, international)
- Communities (environmental, professional)
The Employee category is different in the sense that this relationship is internal, where others communicate with the outside world.
To plan for change, it is important to know what to do about these relationships. You might see this as a complicated version of Client Relationship Management, where different groups of clients have different roles. Each relationship must be managed differently.
Managing this stakeholder context is managing the important network your business ‘got caught in’ during its business cycle. This context provides valuable information that supports the change management process.
The stakeholder view can be used for both small companies and large caps. To manage each relationship you must be well prepared, but you don’t have to know everything beforehand. In a way, you need to manage expectations. You also need to hear very well what is at stake in the game. You cannot negotiate with relationships if you don’t know how you value the relationship.
To give an example:
A bank is changing its strategy. Many of the local branches will be closed due to the fact that the Internet is a growing channel. However, there is a group (community) of older people who, although they do not belong to the main focus group (80%), will resist in this new approach.
If you haven’t included them in the stakeholder view, you’ll have to rework once you think it’s available. They, representing perhaps only less than 20%, will give you many exceptions to handle.
© 2005 Hans Bool