Stakeholder engagement planning with stakeholder software

Stakeholder Relationship Management (SRM) software is a platform for managing stakeholder information, communications, and engagement activities. However, did you know that an enterprise SRM can also help strengthen and mitigate risk during stakeholder engagement planning? In this post, we discuss what a stakeholder engagement plan is, how SRM can help during planning, and why Jambo SRM software is the best choice. 

What is a good stakeholder engagement plan?

A good stakeholder engagement plan defines your project's goal and what you hope to achieve through your engagements. It touches on:

• Whom are you going to talk to
  • How you'll talk to them (the tactics you will use)
  • What you'll talk to them about
• When you're going to the engagement (engagement timeline)
• Any risks to be aware of as a team

How an SRM can help during stakeholder engagement planning

As you begin engaging with and learning about your stakeholders, you'll collect a wealth of important information that you'll need to keep track of. Using Stakeholder Relationship Management (SRM) software enables you to quickly add this information to a stakeholder profile, ensuring it's organized, accessible, and easy to analyze.

When data is organized, you can use it to your advantage. The more you use it, the more valuable and powerful your SRM becomes during all stages of stakeholder engagement. Here are some ways it helps during stakeholder engagement planning stages:

1. How your SRM helps during stakeholder mapping and analysis 

Stakeholder mapping is an exercise that identifies project stakeholders, whether individuals or organizations. Stakeholder analysis involves prioritizing stakeholders based on their level of interest and influence in a project.

An SRM can help during stakeholder mapping and analysis by:

• Helping you understand the stakeholder contact information you already have. Quickly check your SRM to see which stakeholders identified during your mapping and analysis for whom you already have profiles created.
• Find gaps in your data. Beyond missing contact information, your SRM can also help you spot other missing data or opportunities. For example:
  • There may be communities you need to engage with, but after reviewing the locations of your existing stakeholders, you realize you don't have any contacts in these areas. Seeing this gap, you'll know to plan engagements to meet that need.
  • After identifying stakeholders you plan to engage with, you may notice issues they raised during previous projects that haven't been resolved. With this understanding, you can plan accordingly.
• Learn about previous engagements, issues, or commitments with stakeholders. You can use your SRM to view the engagement history stakeholders have with your organization. Review stakeholder profiles to find out things like:
  • What the stakeholder has said in the past
  • What kind of engagements they've participated in (in-person, virtual, phone, etc.)
  • Any commitments made to them previously
  • Any issues they've raised
  • Ideas of what they care about

With these learnings in mind, you can better understand your stakeholders, tailor your tactics to meet their expectations and preferences, and plan with your team to engage strategically and effectively.

2. How an SRM helps when scheduling stakeholder engagements

Your stakeholder engagement plan describes the timeline of engagements you hope to action. Scheduling the actual engagements in your SRM will help you visualize the timeline more clearly. You'll be able to easily see whether it's achievable given the resources you have available, or if there are any risks to the timeline you can address early.

Collaborate with your internal stakeholders, teams, and other departments within your organization to identify opportunities for internal collaboration and identify any potential risks. You can use your SRM to create a report of all planned engagements and circulate it internally for review to identify concerns or gaps. Then you can discuss and work together to choose the best next steps.

Some possible risks you may identify during these internal reviews include:

• Overlapping scheduled engagements.
• Identify stakeholders engaged in different projects. Use this to determine if there is an opportunity to host a single engagement that covers two separate topics.
• Engagements planned in similar locations that could be moved around or be held on the same day.
• Too many engagements are planned during a period of time that wouldn't be achievable without extra resource support.
• Unresolved issues from previous engagement with one or more stakeholders.

With all your future engagements logged in an SRM, it's easy to understand what's ahead so that you can be a more prepared and efficient team.

Jambo stakeholder engagement tool will set you up for success

By using an SRM during your engagement planning, you'll lighten your workload, reduce your project risks, and create the data-driven foundation you'll need to stay on track with your goals.

Jambo is the fastest and easiest Stakeholder Relationship Management (SRM) software. Book a 15-minute discovery call with a Jambo expert to learn more!