A stakeholder is anyone with an interest, or stake, in your project. They do not need to work on your project directly. Some stakeholders will support your project objectives, while others try to sabotage your project success.
Thus, you, as the project manager, will track all of the project stakeholders, their roles, their expectations, their support level, and their impact level in a document called the Stakeholder Register PMP®.
In fact, the purpose of creating and maintaining the stakeholder register is to increase project acceptance. This article will teach you can to create a stakeholder register for your own project.
Download this excel file to follow along.
Your stakeholder register is a confidential document that will not be shown to clients or anyone outside of your project team!
This document contains too much sensitive information. Imagine a client getting hold of this document and learning your unflattering thoughts about them? Your team can face dismissal if this document got into the wrong hands.
Elements within your Stakeholder Register PMP®
Level of Support Required:
1-Supports Actively – Anticipates and feels the need for change, actively works with the project team
2-Supports – Anticipates and feels the need for change, but does not involve with the project team
3- Neutral – Neither supporting nor opposing
4- Opposes – Neither feels the need for change, nor trying to prevent the change
5- Opposes Actively – Doesn’t see the need for change, actively working to prevent the change
Current Level of Support Provided:
1-Supports Actively – Anticipates and feels the need for change, actively works with the project team
2-Supports – Anticipates and feels the need for change, but does not involve with the project team
3- Neutral – Neither supporting nor opposing
4- Opposes – Neither feels the need for change, nor trying to prevent the change
5- Opposes Actively – Doesn’t see the need for change, actively working to prevent the change
Impact if Estimated Level of Support not Attained:
Provide the impact rating from 1 – 5, with 5 being the highest impact and 1 the smallest impact:
1- No Impact
2-25% possibility
3-50% possibility
4-75% possibility
5-Project failure
Stakeholder Risk Rating:
Rate the stakeholder 1 or 2, with 2 being the highest and 1 the smallest risk stakeholders. Use your judgement in deciding how to handle each stakeholder, and where the greatest risk resides:
1 – Yellow
2 – Red
Where,
Yellow stakeholders should be included in project risk assessment if impact is rated as ‘5 – Project failure’
Red stakeholders should be included in project risk assessment and managed throughout
Stakeholder Issues & Concerns:
Issues affecting the stakeholders support for the change (e.g. ,ramp down, reorganization, etc.)
Stakeholder View on Required Level of Support:
What results will the change bring to the project if the required level of support is provided? How is the change impacting the project efficiency, impacting other stakeholders and scope?
Influence Strategy:
The strategy to influence all the stakeholders whose lack of support significantly impacts project success. How do you influence these stakeholders to gain their support?
To start creating your own stakeholder register PMP®, download this template to get started.