Managing stakeholders is like organising a big, complex party. You need to know who to invite, understand what each guest likes and keep everyone happy and informed. For a business analyst working on a digital business change initiative, this means identifying the right people, talking to them in ways they understand and keeping them connected throughout the project. Here’s a detailed but simple guide on how to do this effectively.

This initial step involves identifying all potential stakeholders who might affect or be affected by the business change initiative. Start by figuring out who needs to be involved. Knowing who your stakeholders are helps you focus your efforts correctly.

There are two models that you can use to identify your stakeholders, each model takes a very different approach, so which model to use?

Power/Interest Grid

A simple tool called the power / interest Grid helps you see who has the power to impact the project as well as how much they care about it. This method of identifying stakeholders has been rolled out to huge numbers of business analysts across a large number of organisations through BCS training courses, but does it work?
Rumour has it that this method often gets off to a great start, but then peters out once the overhead of maintaining all the management/communications kicks in – the team realise there isn’t enough time in the day to manage stakeholders and deliver the actual business change. Often, projects are underfunded when what the project really needs is at least one FTE (full time equivalent) as a line item in the budget to concentrate solely on managing/communicating with stakeholders.

Stakeholder salience

Stakeholder salience identifies the importance of stakeholders in a project based on their power, legitimacy and urgency. It helps business analysts prioritise and address the needs of key stakeholders effectively, ensuring those who can significantly impact the project receive the most attention.

Make a list of everyone you think is related to the project — this can include employees, bosses, suppliers and customers. Think about the selection criteria written in bold above and depending on which model you choose, decide who needs your attention.