Table Of ContentStakeholder-led Project Management
Second Edition
Changing the Way We Manage Projects
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Louise M. Worsley r
s Stakeholder-led Project Management
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If stakeholders matt er, then they must make a diff erence in the way we plan, structure, and Changing the Way We Manage Projects
execute projects. Do they matt er on your projects?
This book provides a stakeholder-centered analysis of projects and explains which iden� fi ca� on,
analysis, communica� on, and engagement models are relevant to diff erent types of projects:
Louise M. Worsley
from an offi ce move to IT enterprise change to transforma� onal business change and complex
social change.
Using case studies from around the world, it illustrates what goes wrong when stakeholders are
not engaged successfully and what lessons we can learn from these examples.
In this second edi� on, we also look at the impact of Agile prac� ces on the stakeholder
management process. What changes in approach can we an� cipate, and what prac� ces must S
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con� nue regardless of the product development life cycle adopted? a
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Key models introduced include: o
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• Role-based and agenda-based stakeholders er
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• The stakeholder-neutral to stakeholder-led project con� nuum le
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• The extended stakeholder management process
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• Purposeful communica� on—the six whys model for communica� on r
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• The principles of stakeholder engagement je
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• Stakeholder engagement in an agile world. t
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Louise Worsley has been a project management consultant, lecturer, and coach for nearly a
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30 years. She is a visi� ng lecturer at the University of Cape Town on the MSc in project a
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management, a judge on the PMO Global Awards, and the Chairperson of the judging commi� ee e
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for the PMO South Africa Awards.
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Louise is a regular contributor to project management online forums, providing ar� cles and case
studies in a variety of areas related to project and program management. As the joint leader
of the Success Stories Shared ini� a� ve to encourage learning across the South African project
manager community, she has captured and shared project stories with a par� cular focus on
eff ec� ve stakeholder engagement strategies.
Portfolio and Project Management Collection
Timothy J. Kloppenborg, Editor
ISBN: 978-1-95253-876-6
Stakeholder-led Project
Management
Stakeholder-led Project
Management
Changing the Way We Manage
Projects
Second Edition
Louise M. Worsley
Stakeholder-led Project Management, Second Edition: Changing the Way
We Manage Projects
Copyright © Business Expert Press, LLC, 2020.
Cover image licensed by Ingram Image, StockPhotoSecrets.com
Cover and interior design by Exeter Premedia Services Private Ltd.,
Chennai, India
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any
means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other
except for brief quotations, not to exceed 400 words, without the prior
permission of the publisher.
First published in 2020 by
Business Expert Press, LLC
222 East 46th Street, New York, NY 10017
www.businessexpertpress.com
ISBN-13: 978-1-95253-876-6 (paperback)
ISBN-13: 978-1-95253-877-3 (e-book)
Business Expert Press Portfolio and Project Management Collection
Collection ISSN: 2156-8189 (print)
Collection ISSN: 2156-8200 (electronic)
First edition: 2020
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America.
Abstract
If stakeholders matter, then their impact should affect the way we plan,
execute, and implement projects. Most projects—and all valuable proj-
ects—have stakeholders and require some form of stakeholder engage-
ment. It is the engagement that needs managing, not the stakeholders,
because the right type of engagement varies depending on the types of
stakeholders involved and the context of the project.
This book provides a stakeholder-centered analysis of projects and
explains which identification, analysis, communication, and engagement
models are relevant to different types of projects: from an office move to
IT enterprise change to transformational business change and complex
social change. Using case studies from around the world, it illustrates
what goes wrong when stakeholders are not engaged successfully and
what lessons we can learn from these examples.
In this second edition, we also look at the impact of Agile practices
on the stakeholder management process. What changes in approach can
we anticipate, and what practices must continue regardless of the product
development life cycle adopted.
Key models introduced include:
• Role-based and agenda-based stakeholders
• The stakeholder-neutral to stakeholder-led project continuum
• The extended stakeholder management process
• Purposeful communication—the six whys model for commu-
nication
• Power and influence mapping
• The seven principles of stakeholder engagement
Keywords
project management; program management; stakeholder engagement;
Agile; communications; stakeholder management; project governance;
project communication; sociodynamic model; salience model
Contents
Foreword ...............................................................................................ix
Acknowledgments ...................................................................................xi
Chapter 1 G etting a Stakeholder Mindset .........................................1
Chapter 2 Stakeholder-Neutral to Stakeholder-Led Projects ............15
Chapter 3 Stakeholder Identification ...............................................37
Chapter 4 Understanding My Stakeholders .....................................55
Chapter 5 Purposeful Communication ............................................77
Chapter 6 Meaningful Engagement ...............................................103
Chapter 7 Stakeholder Engagement in an Agile World ..................129
References ...........................................................................................145
About the Author ................................................................................147
Index .................................................................................................149
Foreword
Lessons learned have long inspired my own development of skills and
understanding of how to improve project management practices. At con-
ferences, it is the case studies delivered by practitioners that I hunt out.
When interviewing or coaching project managers, I listen avidly to their
descriptions of triumphs and challenges. Why did it go wrong or right is
never a simple story, but it is a story that informs the cultural heritage and
wealth of knowledge, which underpins project management.
So, as you can imagine, it was with great delight that I received a dis-
sertation proposal from one of my students on the topic of whether and
how lessons learned were being applied in the business environment. Her
results were clear. That while many lessons were documented, they were
rarely shared and acted upon.
Inspired by this finding and energized by fellow practitioners, I have
worked with others to seek out, listen to, capture, and find new ways to
share our learning in projects. It is now some 200 stories and some five
years later, and it is evident to me that there is so much to be learned from
members of our project communities. In this book, I have attempted
to share at least some of these insights and contextualize them into the
theories and models that have proved useful in supporting stakeholder
engagement across a variety of projects. Why pick stakeholder engage-
ment as the focus? Because time after time, as I sat listening to the stories,
the causes of success and failure were plain to see. Whether it is engag-
ing with political groups, external agencies, senior management, internal
groups, or peers and colleagues, the root causes always came back to the
same thing—how well stakeholders were engaged.
I hope you will find the stories and their interpretation of their lessons
helpful, and that you can reflect and compare with your own experiences
in project management.
