How Effective Contracting Teams Create and Maintain Effective Stakeholder Maps

Jim Bergman

Creating and maintaining stakeholder maps is essential for any contracting team aiming to build strong, transparent, and efficient relationships with their stakeholders. Effective stakeholder mapping helps teams identify the needs, interests, and influence of various contracting stakeholders, thereby ensuring smooth project execution and successful contract management outcomes.

Here’s how effective contracting teams create and maintain their stakeholder maps.

1. Identify Key Stakeholders

The first step in creating a stakeholder map is identifying all the relevant contract management stakeholders. Effective contracting teams begin by listing all potential stakeholders, including:

  • Internal Stakeholders: Team members, managers, and other departments within the organization.
  • External Stakeholders: Clients, suppliers, contractors, government agencies, and regulatory bodies.
  • Influencers: Individuals or groups who may not be directly involved but have influence over the project or its outcomes, such as risk management and auditing.

2. Analyze Stakeholder Interests and Influence

Once the stakeholders are identified, the next step is to analyze their contracting interests and influence. Effective teams use various tools and techniques to assess:

  • Stakeholder Interests: Understanding what each stakeholder expects from the contract, their goals, and concerns.
  • Stakeholder Influence: Evaluating the level of power and influence each stakeholder has over the contract and contracting team’s success or failure.

3. Categorize Stakeholders

Effective contracting teams categorize stakeholders based on their interests and influence in and over the contract. Common categories include:

  • High Influence, High Interest: Key stakeholders who need close management and regular updates.
  • High Influence, Low Interest: Stakeholders who have power but may not be actively interested. They require periodic updates.
  • Low Influence, High Interest: Stakeholders who are interested but lack power. They need regular engagement and updates.
  • Low Influence, Low Interest: Stakeholders with minimal impact, requiring occasional updates.

4. Develop Engagement Strategies

Once contracting stakeholders are categorized, the contracting team needs to develop tailored engagement strategies for each stakeholder group. Strategies may include:

  • Regular Meetings: For high influence, high interest stakeholders, regular face-to-face or virtual meetings ensure ongoing communication and involvement.
  • Periodic Updates: For high influence, low interest stakeholders, periodic email updates or reports keep them informed without overwhelming them.
  • Newsletters and Bulletins: For low influence, high interest stakeholders, newsletters or project bulletins can keep them engaged and informed.
  • Occasional Updates: For low influence, low interest stakeholders, occasional updates may suffice.

5. Continuously Monitor and Update Stakeholder Maps

Effective contract management stakeholder maps are dynamic and require continuous monitoring and updating – much like the contract.  Contracting teams:

  • Regularly Review Stakeholders: Periodically review the stakeholder list to identify any changes in interests or influence.
  • Adjust Engagement Strategies: Modify engagement strategies based on feedback and changes in stakeholder dynamics.
  • Maintain Open Communication: Keep lines of communication open with stakeholders to address any concerns or issues promptly.

Conclusion

Creating and maintaining effective stakeholder maps is crucial for contracting teams to ensure successful contract execution and stakeholder satisfaction. By identifying key stakeholders, analyzing their interests and influence, categorizing them, developing tailored engagement strategies, and continuously monitoring and updating the maps, contracting teams can build strong, transparent, and efficient relationships with their stakeholders and suppliers/contractors. This proactive approach not only enhances contract outcomes but also fosters trust and collaboration among all parties involved, eventually leading to innovation opportunities.

Effective contract stakeholder mapping is an ongoing process that requires attention to detail, active communication, and a commitment to addressing stakeholder ever-evolving needs and concerns. Contracting teams that excel in this practice will find themselves better equipped to navigate the complexities of their contracts and achieve long-term success in delivering value and mitigating risk.

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Published by Jim Bergman

Jim Bergman is a commercial contract professional with global experience spanning the USA, Latin America, UK, Europe, China, South Korea, Japan, India, SE Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Australia. He has worked on a wide range of direct and indirect spend categories in numerous sectors, developing a deep knowledge of services, goods and technology procurement and sales. Across this wide array of commodity and services experience, Jim has found the keys to success in maximizing value for money through customer-supplier relationships founded on innovative category management and strategic sourcing practices, key performance metrics and measures, as well as Total Cost of Ownership principles and collaborative contracting tenets. He has shared his knowledge through advisory engagements, as well as in developing and delivering training programs both on-line and in classrooms, in both open-enrollment and internal environments. Jim has assisted his clients through all phases and steps of contracting, negotiation, strategic sourcing and bidding processes, demonstrating value generation in excess of $250 million. His audiences and clients have included over 7,000 attorneys and commercial professionals students from over 1,000 corporations and public-sector entities.

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