Stakeholder map · Project management · Strategy
How to create a stakeholder map, with a worked example
By T. Krause
A stakeholder map is a plan for who hears what and when, and four boxes of names won't get you there. Here is how to create one, followed through a made-up software migration, including the two notes that move halfway through.
To create a stakeholder map, list every person or group your project affects and everyone who could stop it. Place each one on a grid by how much power they have over the project and how interested they are in it. Then write how you'll involve each of the four boxes, and move the notes when something changes.
The Open University's course Successful IT systems calls this a power/interest grid, with four cells labelled by the strategy for each group: keep satisfied, manage closely, monitor and keep informed. Our board uses the same four. The value is in the plan you write afterwards, because the placement only tells you where to start.
We make Prompt Board, and our stakeholder map template opens on the eight notes below. A flip chart split into four works too.
Two questions for each note
Ask both about the project in front of you, not about the person's standing in the company.
How much power do they have over this project? Could they stop it, delay it, refuse the budget or make people ignore the result? Power here can come without a job title. The Open University calls power "a much more slippery concept" than interest, and points out that groups with little power alone can gain a lot by uniting.
How much do they care about the outcome? Does it change their daily work, their budget or their results? The course calls interest relatively easy to estimate, and warns that it can change over time.
A team can answer both questions wrongly, so treat the first placement as a draft and check it with someone who knows the people involved. The map is your team's opinion of named colleagues, so think about who gets the link before you share it.
An ERP migration, box by box
Everything in this section is invented: the company, the project, the people, the decisions and the changes halfway through. It isn't advice about any real company's auditors, works council or legal duties, which depend on your country and your contracts.
A mid-sized distributor is moving its finance and warehouse work to a new enterprise resource planning system, or ERP. The project lead wrote "Stakeholders: ERP migration" at the top of the board and spent half an hour on it with two colleagues.
The first placement
| Box | Who |
|---|---|
| Manage closely (high power, high interest) | Head of operations, IT director |
| Keep satisfied (high power, low interest) | CFO, works council |
| Keep informed (low power, high interest) | Warehouse leads, accounts team |
| Monitor (low power, low interest) | Facilities, external auditors |
These are the notes on our sample board.
The arguments
Two placements take longest. One colleague says the warehouse leads have more power than the board shows. They can't veto the project, but if they keep using their old spreadsheets, the new system holds wrong stock figures. The group leaves them in Keep informed for now and writes "ask them to test the warehouse screens" beside the note. A note can get more involvement than its box suggests.
The second argument is about the CFO, who signed the budget and hasn't asked about the project since. Low interest, or just a quiet phase? They decide the lead will ask her directly. Asking is often quicker than arguing about what someone thinks.
The plan for each box
Without this step the board is just a chart of names. The lead writes one line per box, with a format and a frequency.
| Box | How they'll involve each group |
|---|---|
| Manage closely | Weekly 30-minute meeting. Decisions are made there. |
| Keep satisfied | Fifteen minutes each month on cost, risk and dates only. |
| Keep informed | Fortnightly update, plus test sessions before go-live. |
| Monitor | A note at each milestone, and a check at the next review. |
The two notes that move
The Open University warns that interest can change, so first judgements need watching. At the first milestone the lead checks the map again, and two notes move.
The test system logs which user scanned which item. The works council wants to talk about that as soon as it hears, so its interest is no longer low. Its note moves from Keep satisfied to Manage closely, and the weekly meeting gets a new standing item.
The go-live date also lands close to the year-end close. The external auditors ask how balances will carry over, and the lead sees that their sign-off could hold up the date. They move from Monitor to Keep satisfied, with a call booked for that month.
Neither move was a failure of the first draft. A map that never changes has probably stopped being read.
What people get wrong with the boxes
Monitor doesn't mean ignore. The Open University labels this cell "minimum effort". A low-effort note at each milestone is enough, and it lets you notice a change like the auditors' question above.
Keep satisfied is the risky box. These people can stop you and aren't paying attention. A long status report is unlikely to get read. Give them the short version on what they care about, and raise problems before they hear about them from someone else.
Groups can hide differences. "Warehouse leads" might be four people with four opinions. Split a note when one person in the group behaves differently from the others.
Stakeholder map or RACI
They answer different questions, and on a large project you may want both.
| Question | Board |
|---|---|
| Who can affect this, and how do we keep them on side? | Stakeholder map |
| Who does each task, and who has the final say? | RACI matrix |
| What are we doing, and who's on the team? | Project kickoff |
If the forces that worry you are laws or markets and not people, try a PESTLE analysis.
Where the grid came from
The name usually attached to it is A. L. Mendelow, and we can't confirm the details. The Open University says the grid "is sometimes referred to as Mendelow's matrix (Mendelow, 1991)", without giving a full reference on that page, and we couldn't find the 1991 work to read. We did find Mendelow's 1981 conference paper on stakeholders and environmental scanning. Its abstract relates scanning to "the dynamism of the environment and the power of the stakeholder", so that pair is power and dynamism, not power and interest. We read the abstract only. Who first drew the grid with these four labels stays unresolved here.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between stakeholder mapping and stakeholder analysis?
The terms overlap, and people use them loosely. In this guide, the analysis is the work of asking what each person has at stake, and the map is the picture you make from it.
Who counts as a stakeholder?
Anyone your project affects, and anyone who could affect your project. That includes people who will use the result and people who could stop it, such as a budget holder or an outside reviewer.
When should you create a stakeholder map?
At the start of a project that touches several teams, and again when a project stalls and you're not sure who's holding it up. Check it at each milestone after that.
What if someone doesn't fit one box?
Place them by your best judgement, then write the exception beside the note, as the team did with the warehouse leads. The boxes set a starting point for how you involve someone, and you can give any person more.
Should the stakeholders see the map?
Think before you share it. "Low interest" can read badly to the person it describes. Our example team keeps the full map within the project team and shares only the plan that applies to each group.
Map your own project
List every name in ten minutes, then argue about placement for twenty. Open the stakeholder map template, replace the ERP notes with yours, and write one line of plan for each box before you close the board. Set a date to look at it again at your first milestone.