Stakeholder management is one of the processes of project management that helps you engage with people, teams, groups, or others who are involved in your projects. This includes customers, marketing teams, project sponsors, software vendors, or SEO experts. The term stakeholder management is used to describe everything from monitoring and influencing to communicating with stakeholders. Take a look at the top eight ways that stakeholder management can improve your outcomes.
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1. It Increases the Clarity of Different Roles
When you have a stakeholder plan, the project managers can more easily set realistic expectations for all of the different stakeholders involved in the project. This makes everyone’s roles much clearer, and it helps them to increase their focus and productivity. In addition, it improves the chance that the project will be successfully completed. Improved productivity and clarity are both essential to keeping a project on track.
2. Stakeholders Are More Engaged in the Project
Sometimes stakeholders have a lot of daily tasks and many different things to keep track of, and they may not be as engaged as you would like. It is important to provide them with a reason for engagement. You need to make sure that they understand the plan, including how it impacts them and how it benefits them. When they understand clearly what their role is, they will be better engaged and help make sure that the project is a success.
3. Stakeholder Management Reduces Risk
When you use stakeholder management systems like Borealis, it will reduce risk. First, it increases clarity surrounding everyone’s roles in the project. In addition, the stakeholders are more engaged. Reducing risks is one of the most critical aspects of project success, and whatever you can do to make sure that each stakeholder understands their role and what the plan is helps to ensure that everyone is well prepared for any challenges along the way.
4. You Prioritize Stakeholders to Improve Efficiency
When you undertake stakeholder management, you start by doing a complete stakeholder analysis that documents each stakeholder and their role. There are different types of stakeholders, and it is important to prioritize them. The high-influence and high-interest stakeholders are those who have a critical role in the project. These include project sponsors.
The high-influence but low-interest stakeholders are other secondary leaders who contribute to the outcome of your projects but don’t have a direct interest.
Next, there are stakeholders with low influence, but high interest. They play supportive roles and can get everyone excited about the project.
The final category is low-influence and low-interest. These stakeholders may work in departments that aren’t directly involved in the project.
5. It Improves Communication
Communication is the key to the successful completion of any project, and stakeholder management includes a detailed communication plan that clearly shows how often and in what manner communication will take place. It also shows how all stakeholders will be updated throughout the project. Details such as the type of communication, the form, who is involved, and how often it will occur, are easily referenced. This is the best way to make sure that everyone is on the same page.
6. It Allows You to Make Better Decisions
Stakeholder management allows you to make better decisions. This type of plan ensures that everyone is focused on the same goals, from the project managers and leaders to all the team members. When the entire process is so clear, people understand their roles. You won’t need to face arguments or resistance. In fact, it will be easier to make decisions because you can run ideas by other people.
7. It Helps You Finish Projects on Time and Under Budget
The main goal of any project is to finish on schedule without going over budget. Using stakeholder management helps to ensure that you fulfil this goal. When your stakeholders are more engaged and understand their roles in the project, you will have fewer expenses that come from surprises. You will also avoid slow downs due to miscommunication. Communicating clearly and making sure that you get the project done on time helps to make your customers happy.
8. It Improves Accountability
It is challenging to hold people accountable when they don’t understand their roles or what they should be doing. You need transparency, a plan, and excellent communication as part of your stakeholder management plan. You need to make sure that everyone understands what outcomes you are working towards, and then follow up so that they know when progress is made. This helps to improve accountability along the way.
When you are planning a project, it is important to use stakeholder management to keep it running smoothly. You need to make sure that all of the stakeholders understand their roles clearly. You should also devise a plan for communication, and make sure that everyone understands where the project is at any time throughout the process.
