A04 – Identify stakeholders

This is a draft of the manual for review. If you have any comments, please email them to info@omimo.org. Please check back for the final version.

What

Some people or organizations may think, correctly or incorrectly, that their interests might be affected by the program in a positive or negative way. They might therefore want to have an impact on the program to protect their interests. Some of them may not have any power to impact you, but you or someone else may want to advocate for them for ethical or other reasons. All people and organizations with a potential for direct or indirect impact on the program are called stakeholders, and they must be managed carefully throughout the program.

The first step in managing stakeholders is to identify who they are, which is not always simple.

Why

You should proactively identify stakeholders and consider what they want, because if you proceed with the program without such a consideration, they may cause problems eventually, and adapting the program later on is usually more costly and time-consuming.

Moreover, some considerations such as preventing loss of life, protecting the environment, and protecting cultural heritage are ethical responsibilities in every program that require careful, early stakeholder identification.

Who

Identifying stakeholders is the first step in discovering solutions and needs the knowledge and experience of the solution ideation team. While they carry out this activity, the program manager helps them by facilitating and problem solving. The program manager should also ensure that this activity is done properly and that there’s a strong, useful list of stakeholders.

How

The solution ideation team members use their experience in similar programs to identify the stakeholders. The archives of past programs in the organization may also be helpful. The team or the program manager may also interview external experts for ideas.

The identified stakeholders are a great resource for finding the missing ones. For this reason, when possible you should interview the stakeholders to see whether they can think of any other stakeholders you might have missed. Finally, in some programs, you might be able to make an announcement asking the public for their opinions, and include direct or indirect questions that can help you find the missing stakeholders. Asking the public is a great option for public programs because, besides offering you great information, it also helps create trust in your stakeholders.

Make sure what you prepare as the list of stakeholders is a meaningful discovery of your program’s environment rather than a generic list of high-level players that would apply to most projects.

There’s a section in the Program Description for the list of stakeholders. Add the list there.