The ultimate guide to stakeholder management
By Aumarie Benipayo
As marketers, our projects are rarely confined to just our own teams. We work with the product team to promote new features, design to provide graphics for our blog posts, or the web team to make sure that our landing pages actually work. So, to be a good marketer, you also need excel in stakeholder management.
Stakeholder management is the ability to anticipate who needs to be informed about and involved in different pieces of a project, and when. This is done with the frequent communication.
But, as we all know, managing dozens of people and projects, making sure everyone is up to date, and keeping track of feedback is well, really hard. Especially when you also have to worry about getting your own work done.
To make the process a little easier, here are some ways we handle stakeholder and request management at Atlassian – with no unexpected hangups.
Identify stakeholders
As you prepare to launch a project involving other people, conduct a stakeholder analysis and determine roles and responsibilities early.
Practically, this looks like a good old-fashioned brainstorm where you consider and assess who this project’s outcomes are going to directly impact:
Whose workflows will be affected
Whose approval you’ll need to complete the project
Whose end product will change
The people identified in these questions are your stakeholders.
Conduct a stakeholder analysis
Create a grid with potential stakeholders on the left axis of the page and potential project outcomes across the top of the page. Fill in what those project outcomes would mean for your stakeholders. Use this information to help you decide which stakeholders you’re inviting directly into the project.
Document roles and responsibilities
Defining roles will help give stakeholders clarity about what skills, insight, and time they need to bring into a project. This will also minimize the amount of “empty space” that a stakeholder might perceive in the project’s process. Use documentation to solidify those roles and keep them top of mind throughout your project.
Struggling with managed dependencies or role confusion? Use the roles and responsibilities play to clarify who is doing what.
At Atlassian, we put a 2x4 table at the top of every project-related document in Confluence so that everyone always knows where they stand. Using the DACI framework, we assign:
- A driver: who is in charge of managing stakeholders and making sure decisions are made on time.
- An approver: who has the final say in decision-making.
- Contributors: who can offer expert opinions for consideration or are directly involved in the project.
- Informed stakeholders: who are notified of decisions.
Create a DACI right from the start for every project or campaign. That’s not to say you need to be rigid. Just set expectations up front for who needs to be consulted for a sign off and who has ultimate responsibility for getting it all done.
Get the kick-off right
Setting roles and responsibilities only works if everyone understands how those roles support your project's desired outcome.
Setup a kickoff meeting to ensure buy-in, set stakeholder expectations, determine a check-in cadence, and communicate how decisions will be made. Build your meeting around feedback and keep your talk-time to a minimum. Give an overview of the project in the beginning, but let this be the opportunity to let stakeholders poke holes in your plan and your management strategy.
Use the project plan template in Confluence to outline your project and review in your kickoff meeting.
With a great kickoff meeting, you can make sure all of your stakeholders are on the same page before a project begins, and facilitate good relationships across the various teams.
Centralize information-sharing
Laying out all of the relevant information for stakeholders communicates trust and eliminates unnecessary questions and meetings. It also empowers them to make decisions quickly and offer quality problem solving faster.
At Atlassian we make Confluence spaces dedicated to an individual project, especially if it’s cross-functional. This offers easy access to information, and a neutral and centralized place for documenting everything related to a project.
In our space we showcase:
- An overview of the project
- Goals, scope, and milestones for the project
- A list of team members and a description of who’s responsible for what
- Recently updated pages relating to the project
- Links to any and all relevant information related to the project
Establish a communication strategy
Set a plan for how you’re going to communicate with stakeholders, or you’ll find yourself checking in “as you think of it,” which is exactly what you want to avoid. Setting dates, determining methods, and documenting your check-ins is a must for effective stakeholder management.
End the endless update meetings. Set up your project in Team Central to make updates as easy as a Tweet. Every Friday, you’ll get a reminder to post an update, and every Monday your stakeholders will get the update. No meetings required.