In this blog, we’re covering five best practices to improve stakeholder engagement, but even just doing this research is a best practice in itself!
It’s easy to get stuck in the monotony of your activities and do the same things each day, especially as your project gets busy. However, it’s vital to remember that environments are constantly changing, as are your stakeholders, world events, and the issues faced by the communities you are engaging with. It's also important to remember that keeping stakeholder engagement effective is crucial to your project and organization's success. So, it’s always important to re-evaluate your processes to see what’s working well and be open to ideas that might work better.
Remember, stakeholder engagement is about continuous improvement. What you did last year, or during your last project might not work this time. Be open to learning from your past experiences and looking into other best practices that could improve your project moving forward.
Best practices are something to think about throughout the entire span of your project. Stakeholder engagement has phases, so as you enter a new phase or try a new tactic, it’s a great opportunity to evaluate and reflect on your processes or strategies and be critical of what worked and what didn’t.
The more often you reflect, the more opportunities you have to be responsive, incorporate feedback, and mitigate any risks as they arise.
From the outset of your project, define your goals and what success would look like.
Often, we start by looking at what we must do (e.g., the standards we must meet for regulatory requirements or internal goals set by your organization). But is meeting these requirements your measure of success, or does it go beyond that?
Looking beyond what’s required, ask yourself what might success look like from the perspective of your communities and stakeholders? What would success look like from an organizational perspective in its journey to achieve its goals or priorities?
Ways you may define success:
Whatever way you define success, ensure it’s clearly defined early on, so your project and engagements can align with it.
A tip from our stakeholder engagement specialist: Discussing what success looks like with your stakeholders right from the beginning of your project is a great opportunity to help you build mutual understanding early on. This shared vision of success can help build social capital, which could help protect your organization and your partnerships as things change or issues arise.
Identifying your stakeholders and communities is one of the vital steps you'll take early in your project. Challenge yourself to think beyond just those who live in the area you're operating in. Consider everyone who could be impacted by your project and those who might have different interests or connections to the community members or the community itself that you may need to understand and manage.
Questions for identifying your stakeholders and communities:
A tip from our stakeholder engagement specialist: Be open to adding new stakeholders and communities throughout this process as you learn more and talk to different people. The stakeholders you have at the beginning may look different than those you have at the end—growth will happen to your audience throughout your project.
Stakeholder mapping is a valuable exercise to help you identify all your stakeholders and communities. Learn how to do a stakeholder mapping exercise.
Plan and set a schedule for communicating with your communities and stakeholders so you can focus on building trust and gaining useful information each time you interact. Without a set schedule, it’s easy to forget about people when you’re in the throws of your project. Weeks and months fly by, and you suddenly realize you’ve forgotten to follow up!
Instead, set and follow a schedule to show your stakeholders and communities they can count on regular updates from you (even when there’s nothing new to report—no news is still news!).
When setting your schedule, consider:
A tip from our stakeholder engagement specialist: Consistency and honesty are essential throughout all your engagements. If you said the project will be completed in the fall after you already said it’ll be completed in the summer, you need to let stakeholders and communities know why this change occurred. Acknowledge the change, let them know why it’s changed, and show them you’re committed to keeping them updated throughout the change.
You must follow through on any promises (or commitments/accommodations) you’ve made to your stakeholders and communities.
Whether you made big promises during the planning stages that you won't be able to fulfill until your project is complete or made small promises during an engagement session, it's essential to stay on top of them. Tracking all your promises will help you ensure you never forget one.
How to keep track of and fulfill your promises:
A tip from our stakeholder engagement specialist: If you have a team that tends to change often or you have multiple contributors, ensure you can keep track of every promise so it can be remembered no matter who made it.
Integrating your promises into your stakeholder engagement reporting can be a great way to stay on track and understand what still needs to be done. If you’ll be managing a lot of information or running various reports, an SRM can help you build these reports quickly and easily.
Understanding and removing barriers to participation that your communities and stakeholders may face can significantly improve the quantity and quality of your engagement.
To help remove barriers to participation, consider:
You’ve identified your stakeholders and communities as an essential part of your project, and you know their perspectives are valuable, so how can you help them participate in the conversation?
Practical options to help your audiences participate:
A tip from our stakeholder engagement specialist: If you’re not getting the kind of participation, you thought you would, you can always ask people, “how do you want to be engaged? Do you have any ideas or suggestions? Do you know what works well for your community?” You can also ask your stakeholders for feedback and input on your engagement process and adjust your tactics accordingly.
Don’t be afraid to try something you’ve never done before. If you are trying something new, you can communicate that to your stakeholders by saying, “we’re trying a new format and would like your feedback. Does this work well for you?”
Stakeholder engagement is constantly evolving, so reflecting on your progress and continuously learning about best practices is key to your project’s success. Ensure that your stakeholder engagement is always meaningful; check out our blog for tips!
If you’re interested in learning about five important stakeholder engagement trends with expert advice on more best practices, check out our blog with Kim Hyshka from Dialogue Partners.