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What is Stakeholder Analysis?

March 12, 2008 | Author: PM Hut | Filed under: Project Stakeholder Management

What is Stakeholder Analysis?
By S. Babou

First just a definition of project stakeholders:

Project stakeholders are individuals and organizations that are actively involved in the project, or whose interests may be affected as a result of project execution or project completion.

Stakeholders are all those who need to be considered in achieving project goals and whose participation and support are crucial to its success. So identification of all stakeholders is an important activity of the project manager to ensure project success.

As all we know, stakeholders can be 1) individuals within the project 2) individuals or departments within the organization & 3) individuals or groups outside the organization (can be influencers)

Stakeholder Management processes for a project involves (but not limited to)

  1. Identifying all stakeholders
  2. Documenting stakeholders needs
  3. Assessing & analyzing stakeholders interest/influence
  4. Managing stakeholders expectations
  5. Taking actions
  6. Reviewing status & repeat

Stakeholder Management Processes

What is Stakeholder Analysis?

Stakeholder Analysis is an important technique for stakeholder identification & analyzing their needs. It is used to identify all key (primary and secondary) stakeholders who have a vested interest in the issues with which the project is concerned.

The aim of stakeholder analysis process is to develop a strategic view of the human and institutional landscape, and the relationships between the different stakeholders and the issues they care about most.

What are the benefits of Stakeholder Analysis?

A stakeholder analysis can help a project to identify:

  • The interests of all stakeholders, who may affect or be affected by the project
  • Potential issues that could disrupt the project
  • Key people for information distribution during executing phase
  • Groups that should be encouraged to participate in different stages of the project
  • Communication planning & stakeholder management strategy during project planning phase
  • Ways to reduce potential negative impacts & manage negative stakeholders

Engaging stakeholders throughout the project life cycle is a key to (but not a guarantee of) project’s success.

Managing stakeholders expectations & ensuring their active involvement is very much important to project as:

  • It is indispensable for continuation of the project & its successful completion
  • It gives opportunity to individuals or groups to express their ideas/issues/concerns over the project
  • It gives a sense of accountability and enhances responsibility
  • It enables effective risk identification & response planning
  • It opens up excellent learning opportunity for both the project team and stakeholders

S. Babou is a PMP since 2004. He has more than 8 Years of experience in IT. Babou worked in different product development & implementation projects. He is currently working as Project Manager in a MNC in India. He’s practicing project management for past 4 years. Babou has a blog http://leadershipchamps.wordpress.com to share project management & leadership knowledge. Babou did his masters (M.S) in software systems from BITS, Pilani,India.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 12th, 2008 and is filed under Project Stakeholder Management. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

8 people have left comments

The stackholder analysis article was very good and explained very neatly and understandable.Thanks for such a good article.

Latha wrote on March 13, 2008 - 12:10 am | Visit Link

Thank you clear presentattion of stakeholder analysis. It did add value.

SK Chauke wrote on April 3, 2008 - 10:03 am | Visit Link

[...] What is Stakeholder Analysis? - Part 2 [...]

PM Hut » What is Stakeholder Analysis? - Part 2 wrote on April 11, 2008 - 7:24 am | Visit Link

[...] What is Stakeholder Analysis - Part 3 [...]

PM Hut » What is Stakeholder Analysis - Part 3 wrote on April 15, 2008 - 11:11 am | Visit Link

Thank You so much Mr PM Hut from your definitions it is easy for me to understand the topic.

Hamad Maqsood wrote on November 2, 2010 - 12:36 pm | Visit Link

I enjoy your elaborative stakeholder analysis approach.

Keep it up!

Joseph Kawele
Zambia

joseph Kawele wrote on May 5, 2011 - 5:30 am | Visit Link

i would to extend my sincere appreciation to whoever wrote this stakeholder analysis, thanks so much. As far as i am concerned these notes have helped me do my research.

oriada faustino wrote on December 2, 2011 - 3:27 am | Visit Link

Thanks to all of you for valuable comments.

S.Babou wrote on February 16, 2012 - 12:53 pm | Visit Link

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