Stakeholder Engagement: How To Get Stakeholders On Your Side

• Tweet

• Tweet

 Powered by Max Banner Ads 

Have you ever had an idea that was truly superb?

The kind of inspirational concept that makes you wake up with a grin on your face and bound in to work, knowing that you’re on to a surefire winner?

Good, isn’t it?

It’s these moments at work that make it all worthwhile.

The light bulb genius moments, the ones that justify the stress and worry and tight deadlines and lost hours slaving over a PC. When you hit upon a superb idea for making things better, you know that you are on the cusp of proving yourself beyond all doubt to your superiors.

Your bosses will realise just how fantastic you are at your role, and your promotion and annual bonus are assured.

But…there could be one small problem.

Stakeholder Engagement

This is where the light bulb moment is shared by many people, rather than you struggling to persuade people of the benefit of your initiative.

Why stakeholder engagement can be hard to procure

When people get great ideas, they are always theoretical. They can be based on intuition, experience, fact or common sense, but they are never proven. If something is already proven, it isn’t a new initiative. This means that, by default, great ideas take a leap of faith before other people can believe in them.

A great example of this is internal communications.

Because internal comms are considered by many people as ‘fluff’, or extraneous to ‘proper’ activities such as product development or sales, where money can be seen to be generated, they are often left at the bottom of the list of company priorities. Great internal communications lead to enhanced staff morale, which in turn improves productivity and buy-in from employees.

The issue is, these benefits cannot be exactly calculated when it comes to establishing return on investment. This means many corporations don’t invest as much as they should in communications, as they fail to prove the benefit of the initial investment.

Similarly, your great idea has no proven benefit when it comes to demonstrating profit generation or process enhancements. Here’s how to gain buy-in from your key stakeholders, when you need to get the go-ahead to roll out your idea without concrete proof of its effectiveness…

Seed out potential advocates

Different people have different styles at work, and early adopters are much more likely to be able to imagine the benefits from an idea without actually seeing it in action. If you can identify who is most likely to champion your initiative, speak to them before you launch your idea fully, and request that they support you.

Engage people by asking for help

Appeal to people’s good will when you launch a new project. Explain that it will take a leap of faith, and ask them to get actively involved in supporting you, through specific tasks. This will make people more likely to support you.

Plot as many projected returns as you can

By plotting return on investment as closely as possible, you will be able to give an approximation of how your idea will succeed. Map out projected returns with as much detail as you can, to sway stakeholder engagement.

Find examples where your idea has worked for rival companies

If your idea has been tried successfully elsewhere, get hold of as much information as you can about its success, and document it all.

Outline the results if you DON’T adopt the initiative

Sometimes, it can be much easier to explain the effects of not launching a new initiative, than it can to demonstrate the benefits if you do. Try turning your argument on its head and look at it from this perspective, to see if you can find a more persuasive argument for adoption.

How do you get stakeholders on your side?

Please share your views in the comments below.

__________________________________________________________________________