Project stakeholders are persons or entities who have an interest in a specific
project
A project is a type of assignment, typically involving research or design, that is carefully planned to achieve a specific objective.
An alternative view sees a project managerially as a sequence of events: a "set of interrelated tasks to be ...
. According to the
Project Management Institute
The Project Management Institute (PMI, legally Project Management Institute, Inc.) is a U.S.-based not-for-profit professional organization for project management.
Overview
PMI serves more than five million professionals including over 680,0 ...
(PMI), the term ''project stakeholder'' refers to "an individual, group, or
organization
An organization or organisation (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English; American and British English spelling differences#-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization), see spelling differences) is an legal entity, entity—such as ...
, who may affect, be affected by, or perceive itself to be affected by a
decision,
activity, or outcome of a project,
program, or portfolio.
ISO 21500 uses a similar definition.
Types of stakeholders
Stakeholders may be located inside or outside an
organization
An organization or organisation (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English; American and British English spelling differences#-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization), see spelling differences) is an legal entity, entity—such as ...
, including:
# The project's
sponsor;
# Those with an interest or the potential to gain from the successful completion of a project;
# Anyone who may have a positive or negative influence in the project completion.
The following are examples of project stakeholders:
* Project leader
*
Senior management
Senior management, executive management, or upper management is an occupation at the highest level of management of an organization, performed by individuals who have the day-to-day tasks of managing the organization, sometimes a company or a cor ...
*
Project team members
* Project
customer
In sales, commerce, and economics, a customer (sometimes known as a Client (business), client, buyer, or purchaser) is the recipient of a Good (economics), good, service (economics), service, product (business), product, or an Intellectual prop ...
* Community Served or the
Community
A community is a social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given g ...
that is being
Served (example of a stakeholder affected by a
non-profit organization
A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...
or
government agency
A government agency or state agency, sometimes an appointed commission, is a permanent or semi-permanent organization in the machinery of government (bureaucracy) that is responsible for the oversight and administration of specific functions, s ...
)
*
Resource
''Resource'' refers to all the materials available in our environment which are Technology, technologically accessible, Economics, economically feasible and Culture, culturally Sustainability, sustainable and help us to satisfy our needs and want ...
managers
*
Line managers
*
Product user group
* Project
testers
* Any group impacted by the project as it progresses
* Any group impacted by the project when it is completed
*
Subcontractor
A subcontractor is a person or business which undertakes to perform part or all of the obligations of another's contract, and a subcontract is a contract which assigns part of an existing contract to a subcontractor.
A general contractor, prime ...
s to the project
*
Consultants to the project
Stakeholder management
By the beginning of the 21st century, stakeholders have been considered more and more as the crucial human factor that defines the perception of success of a project, particularly the
beneficiaries of the project's outcomes. This has increased the focus on
stakeholder management within the general topic of
project management
Project management is the process of supervising the work of a Project team, team to achieve all project goals within the given constraints. This information is usually described in project initiation documentation, project documentation, crea ...
.
Rather than focusing on one subset of stakeholders, Lynda Bourne advocates prioritizing all stakeholders and focusing your attention on the "most important" at this point in time. Her view of importance encompasses an assessment of the power, proximity and urgency associated with each stakeholder. She calls her methodology a "Stakeholder Circle".
The rationale for this emphasis on
decision makers is part of project stakeholder management and a key component in affecting change in an organization.
John Hotter describes
stakeholder analysis and stakeholder management as essential components of
change management.
See also
*
Stakeholder register
Citations
References
*
*Freeman, R E (1984), ''Strategic Management: a Stakeholder Approach'', Pitman Series in Business and Public Policy, Harpercollins College Div; First Edition.
*
*
*
{{Authority control
Corporate finance
Project management
de:Stakeholder#Stakeholder im Projektmanagement