Who are the stakeholders during a change process? Stakeholders are people who are impacted by a change in some ways. People whose lives at work are changing for the better or for the worse and therefore are quite naturally anxious about it. Those who are especially impacted negatively will undergo some stress situations. This could be because they are loosing “face”, prestige, power, position, role, authority, ownership or territory in their project, function, department or company. As well as because they are gaining new responsibilities, new tasks, new processes etc that they particularly don’t like or are ready for.
What kind of issues can you face with unhappy stakeholders? Some examples of issues that you may face with stakeholders who are under stress are:
- Complain about head quaters, company and management policies
- Reluctant to cooperate or collaborate
- Hesitate to give or share accurate information
- Avoid meeting and discussions to resolve issues
- Take things personally and emotionally
- Demonstrate unfriendly and unprofessional behaviors
- Communicate impolitely or in hostile ways
Can you trust stakeholders? I don’t want to sound nasty to say that you can’t trust stakeholders but the truth is that the stakeholders are going through change and therefore are subject to emotional stress, discomfort and demotivation. These situations do not offer the stakeholders a stable environment to make well-thought out decisions. I would recommend trusting all your stakeholders but to be prepared to understand as well handle a situation when that trust was not honoured. Its largely possible due to the situation that they are in, not because they are unreliable people.
How do you get stakeholders to trust you? Be consistent. Both your words and actions should always be consistent, in another words – do what you say and say what you do. If you said that you will escalate a topic to the management, then escalate it. If you said that you will review a document and give feedback on it, then give it. If you said that you will show support for a stakeholder in a meeting by sharing a few words, then show it. These consistent behaviors over time will earn not only your stakeholder’s trust but the word also spreads to the other project members.
Be transparent. Share all relevant information with your stakeholders as long as its not confidential. Do not hide information or give an inaccurate picture. Show your willingness to share. Help them to see the big picture, connect for them the dots, explain to them strategies, sent them documents and presentations.
Be the people-person. You have to do the people-person thing. Say sorry to stakeholders when you make a mistake. Show appreciation and say thank you for supportive behaviors. Be humble, frank and honest with your stakeholders. Invest in building up a trustworthy relationship with your stakeholders. Keep in mind that is no success in the change project without their support.
Do the stakeholders trust the management? I think it depends on the company really. But in most cases it is highly possible for stakeholders to distrust management during times of change. I am not saying that the management is unreliable. In many change situations, stakeholders who are impacted by the management’s decisions are not normally in direct contact with the management. They probably have not heard the top management speak or articulate the change message directly. Whenever there is a gap between what is happening on the ground and what people thought would happen, stakeholders normally blame it on the management. And if this happens often enough, clearly you would not trust the management. This is also exactly the reason why the top management should talk to the various stakeholders directly face-to-face in change situations to share their change message and to also listen to their feedback, ideas and suggestions.
How do you motivate stakeholders? If you can show a win-win situation, stakeholders will be more ready to accept and support change. For example, imagine that a stakeholder who happens to be a process owner of an important process has to take now take over responsibilities for another additional 2 steps than before. Clearly he is not going to be pleased. But he will be more willing to go along with this change if he gets something in return. For example, an additional headcount, perhaps additional training, a special trip to the HQ etc.
But the harsh reality of working life is that sometimes there is simply no win-win situation. A stakeholder is clearly not wining, but is losing. That’s why I always emphasize the immediate line manager’s critical role during change. The line manager should talk have an open and frank talk with the stakeholder. Explaining the vision of a better future and how everyone can contribute to get there.
How much success can you have in bringing stakeholders together? A lot! If you are really able to rally the stakeholders towards a common goal, you would probably have overcome most of your change issues. When stakeholders work together, there will be less coordination issues for the project team to manage. They will be more willing to exchange information and to work on mutually beneficial outcomes. The ultimate success in converting a stakeholder into a supporter is when he becomes an ambassador of change for your project. It is very difficult to achieve but it is very possible. It is a very important skill that every change manager should aspire to have – the art of transforming ordinary people into change agents.
What do you really need from stakeholders? Supportive behaviors. You want the stakeholders to accept the change as swiftly as possible and you need them to facilitate the change process from their respective roles and functions. You need them to talk to their bosses, their peers, their staffs etc, to support the change. So that the change can be completed as quickly as possible in a successful manner without impacting the current business. Ultimately this is what you need from key stakeholders in a change project.
How do you manage stakeholders? Managing stakeholders is a completely relationship based topic. It’s not about power or project success or experience or expertise – not stakeholder’s and neither yours. Its simply about looking at one another in the eye and respecting each other as a person. Once you have the stakeholder’s trust and have a reliable relationship in place, you will be able to manage them and the change issues more efficiently.
What is a stakeholder interview? This is one of the first things you do when you take over a change project. After understanding the change request and change target picture from the management, you organise a series of one-to-one interviews with a cross-section of people in the organisation who are are connected or impacted by the change. This is called the stakeholder interview and the outcomes of this hearing session will offer valueble clue and inputs in developing the change strategy, change objectives etc.
What is a stakeholder analysis? There is a structured way to look at all the stakeholders to better understand them. This is called the “stakeholder mapping” and a template can be found at the best practices section of this book. This is done by building the “stakeholder universe”. Each stakeholder is represented by a bubble. The size of the bubble and the distance of the bubble from the project team indicates the importance and proximity of the stakeholder to the project. This stakeholder mapping helps the project team to immediately understand who are the stakeholders we need to focus on at this point in time (map could evolve as the project proceeds). This mapping also becomes and important part of the change management documentation.
For Those In-Charge of Change 