PMBOK7 Perspectives: Analyzing Stakeholder Attitude

In this edition of Project Pointers, we’ll look at stakeholder attitudes, one of the new approaches to analyzing stakeholders in the Project Management Institute’s latest version of the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBoK7.)

In PMBOK7, Knowledge Areas are replaced with Performance Domains, which recommend additional activities in several areas, including stakeholder analysis. Let’s look at challenging stakeholder attitudes and responses that increase your success in stakeholder management.

Inattentive/indifferent. Key stakeholders can behave as if they don’t care about the project or its outcomes even if they would be positively or negatively impacted by those outcomes. They might not pay attention due to their workload, business issues, or other distractions. Remember, your project isn’t the only thing on the stakeholder’s plate.

• To gain the attention of a distracted stakeholder, talk to the stakeholder’s peers and support staff to find ways to engage the stakeholder.
• Use clear and persuasive graphics or flowcharts to show how the project might impact the them. Share this information with the stakeholder’s department.
• Demonstrate that the stakeholder needs to decide between the alternatives by a specific date. Clearly communicate that the project team will make the decision if the stakeholders doesn’t respond by that date. This approach doesn’t guarantee a response from the stakeholder, but it typically gets their attention. If the stakeholder disagrees with your choices, you have documentation that they had an opportunity to make the decision and opted not to.

Fearful. Stakeholders who fear negative project outcomes are challenging to manage. Their past experiences may have been bad. Fear can manifest through micromanagement, requests for overly-detailed status reports, and drawn out decision-making.

Talk to your stakeholder to understand their concerns. You may have risk mitigation plans in place that address their fears. Communicate your plans, or create new risk items, and obtain the stakeholder’s approval for the mitigation and status sharing strategies should their concerns come to fruition. You might reduce their fear by demonstrating that you understand their concerns and have plans to address them.

Demanding and self-centered. All stakeholders are affected by the project by definition. Some stakeholders act as if they are the only project stakeholder. They place demands on the project without regard for the needs of other project stakeholders. If the demanding stakeholder is your sponsor, that is likely their prerogative. If not, emphasize the other project requirements you are managing with this stakeholder. If they continue to show no regard for other stakeholders, get your sponsor involved to negotiate with this demanding stakeholder. (Remember, the project sponsor is responsible for the project and its outcomes, and wants to see the project succeed.) The sponsor can then help you reprioritize the project requirements. At that point, you can cite the sponsor’s directions when you deal with the demanding stakeholder.

Wheeler/dealer. Stakeholders might offer funding or resources for a project in a bid to get their desired outcomes added to a project. They might be extraordinarily persistent! This can seem like a variation on the demanding stakeholder in the previous point. You might consider asking them to work with the sponsor to prioritize their outcomes. It might make sense to introduce new requirements or reprioritize requirements in exchange for benefits. For that reason, the best approach is to handle these proposals through your standard project change management practices.

Indecisive. Slow decision-making by stakeholders impacts project schedules -- and cost when resources assignments must be extended. Being proactive is the best way to address this situation. Major project decisions have to be made after stakeholders consider the pros and cons of alternatives. Include a specific task, assigned to the sponsor or key stakeholders, delineating the decision to be made and the time allocated for them to research and consider their position. In addition, calculate and communicate what it costs for each day that the major project decision is delayed. This can help illuminate highlight the impact stakeholder indecisiveness has on your project. You can also use this information to create a project change request to alter the project schedule and budget due to the decision-making delays.

Have experience with any or all of these stakeholder attitudes? If you have insights and suggestions for dealing with them, add them in the comments section.

For more about stakeholders, check out Natasha Kasimtseva’s Managing Project Stakeholders course .

Coming Up

Bonnie Biafore and John Riopel will talk about how to manage dependencies, meetings, and overall communication in hybrid projects on February 17, 2022, at 1PM MT . Traditional and agile/iterative project management approaches have similarities and differences, so you might wonder how to manage hybrid projects that use both. Although the approaches differ, there are points within a hybrid project where deliverables need to align. For example, a traditional deliverable must be completed before part of the agile effort can start – or vice versa. Even in hybrid projects, the project team is a single team that needs good communication and occasional team-wide meetings to make sure the project is successful.

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