The Flow of the Stakes
05. Mar, 2010 
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In order to have a “happy project,” a software project manager should respect the flow of the stakes…
- Stakeholders have stakes.
- Stakeholders communicate their stakes by expressing their expectations, which are more formally defined by means of requirements to the process or product.
- Project management should make every stakeholder a winner by accepting and inventing requirements that continually satisfy the stakes of individual stakeholders and do not conflict with the general process or the product.
- Project management should give continuous feedback to the stakeholders on the state of the stakes.
- Based upon this feedback, the expectations and requirements might change, and in this way a new cycle begins.
Easy as pie.
Bas,
This is an interesting loop. I like the thinking-backward approach. I also like the logic behind it. Two points may deserve further discussion. These are:
1- The stakeholders’ interests are hanging and seem to connect directly to nothing. May be an addition would strengthen the loop
2- I like the centrality of both the stakeholders and project management. The expansion of the loop will render it suitable for type of social network analysis.
Bas, the visualization of your thinking so clearly proves the point that visuals are more effective communicators than words. Well done, Bas
Hi Ali, thank you for your kind comments. I like your suggestions and will look further into them. It is mainly a balance between adding things without making the model too complex.
Good post, Bas. I just posted on an aspect of this very thought…great to see others thinking of our stakeholders as well!
I think project leaders many times get caught up in the process, tools, and day-to-day activities, forgetting the fact that the project has been undertaken for a reason, and who actually cares about the delivery.
I describe stakeholder “Investments”, and those investments drive not only their expectations, but also impact how they are going to react to certain communications. They tend to add ‘flavor’ to the whole feedback process.
Another good post…thanks!
Good idea. How would you conceive this for multiple stakeholders each pulling the project is a different direction.
Great comments! I wish Matt would elaborate more on his remarkable statement that PM add flavor to the feedback process. The flavor means we do not have any more a plain vanilla cake and thus may change the outcome.
As for Ganathapy your point is great. I have tried to tackle this issue in a presentation entitled
“The Cost of Poor Vision on Companies”, If interested, the link is
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/19238451/The-Cost-of-Poor-Vision-on-Companies
and another presentation entitled Balancing the Balanced Scorecard. The link is
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/17651011/Balancing-the-Balanced-Scorecard
@Ali and Matt… one word .. yes!
@Ganapathy: good issue. basically it’s about negotiation. next to the link ali provides in the previous comment you can research the topic of “principle based negotiation” which basically is about creating situations for mutual gain. Works for a peace process, so why not for projects
Bas, it works for a peace process, so why not for projects? What a great ststement this is. Explore it, expand on it, build on it and the outcomes will be great. Peace processes are not limited to humans, but all living organism. Honestly, the scope of this statement is an expansive one. I only hope you find the time to do something about it.