3.4 Stakeholder engagement plan
To give depth to such a list of stakeholders, and to help with developing your knowledge of them and their power, interest and needs, it is useful to map stakeholders on two different derivatives of a Mendelow power matrix [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] (Mendelow, 1991).
The first matrix indicates the stakeholders’ relative position in terms of their impact on the initiative’s success (their power) and the initiative’s impact on them (their interest). The second matrix gives a view of their level of commitment for the change mapped against their level of readiness.
When taking the two relative positions together, you can begin to build a stakeholder management plan, as shown in Figure 7.
Another dimension to the stakeholder plan is to indicate where their expectations are before the change occurs and where you would want them to be after the change. Table 2 provides an example.
| Stakeholder | A | B | C | D | E |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unaware | CP | ||||
| Resistant | CP | CP | CP | ||
| Neutral | |||||
| Supportive | DP | CP / DP | DP | DP | |
| Leader | DP | ||||
| Your impact on them | High | Low | High | Low | High |
| Their impact on you | High | High | High | Low | Low |
| Level of readiness | Low | Low | High | Low | High |
| Level of commitment | Low | Low | Medium | Low | Low |
| Next comms action | Manage closely | Keep satisfied | Manage closely | Monitor | Keep satisfied |
| Comment/current position | Detailed action plan | Use as advocate | Detailed action plan | Emphasise benefits |
Key:
- CP – Current position
- DP – Desired position
- Manage closely: daily updates, regular invites to exclusive events, personal contact
- Keep satisfied – Weekly updates, invitations to certain occasions
- Monitor – Monthly updates
- Keep informed – Weekly updates, invitations to certain events
Activity 5 Creating a stakeholder engagement plan
Take some time now to think about the stakeholders in your change initiative. Then, drawing on Table 2 above, create a stakeholder engagement plan.
Discussion
Your stakeholder map and engagement plan may evolve during the lifecycle of your change initiative, as you identify and adjust requirements. It is sensible to allocate time to review these at each stage of the process to ensure that your approach continues to be appropriate for the needs of your stakeholders and the needs of the initiative.
Having started to think about your change management process and engaging the stakeholders, you now need to plan ways to communicate the change. This is what we explore in the next section. If you are new to stakeholder management, you may wish to explore the Discovering management course on the OpenLearn platform.