Stakeholders are critical to project success—project management teams rely on them for information, feedback, and support. But occasionally you’ll come across a stakeholder that adds more hassle than help. We’ve put together a field guide to help you spot the four most common flavors of nightmare stakeholders.
1 – The name dropper. It happens all too often: you desperately need help—additional staff, more funding, critical internal support—but when you ask your stakeholder for assistance you get the runaround. Red flags should start flying when the name dropper assures you that the mere mention of them (and often their title) is enough to conjure anything you need.
2 – The empire builder. Just because you’ve partnered with a stakeholder doesn’t mean your Project Team is now their domain. Empire builders often try to get pet projects into the pipeline without going through the normal vetting and approval processes, and may even begin setting tasks that are completely outside your group’s normal areas of responsibility. Unfortunately, this sort of covert takeover goes on all the time, and it can cause serious problems with morale, workflow, and long-term project success.
3 – The vanisher. In the beginning they shouted their support from the rooftops, but now that your project is in full swing they’re nowhere to be found. Vanishers may be too busy to properly participate, or they may have promised more than they can realistically deliver. The bottom line is that all the help your team was promised earlier has evaporated, leaving you with fewer resources than expected.
4 – The bosser. Your new stakeholder assumes that their involvement also entitles them to run their project the way they see fit, rather than deferring to your team’s experience and expertise. Realistic schedules are usually the first to go, followed soon after by budgets and objectives.
We talked about four common types of nightmare stakeholders: the name dropper, the empire builder, the vanisher, and the bosser. How can you keep these difficult but important players from wreaking havoc on your project or your team, while also ensuring they remain supportive and useful? Below we’ve pulled together some tips to help you keep your project on track and prevent your nightmare stakeholders from derailing your team’s success.
4 Tips to Ensure Stakeholders are Supportive and Useful
Including stakeholders in planning activities will help to get everyone’s objectives (both overt and covert) on the table. Empire builders who try to annex your Project Team will likely be thwarted early in the process by the competing interests of other stakeholders, name droppers and vanishers will be less likely to overcommit resources if the details of their promises of support are known within the entire planning group, and bossers won’t get far when they understand that other stakeholders will eventually discover their machinations and (correctly) interpret them as entirely self-serving.
Maintaining regular communication will help to head off a number of nightmare stakeholder issues. Bossers will be more readily kept in check if they’re receiving routine communications on the status of the project, so keep them in the loop regarding support issue updates, personnel change notifications, and milestone progress reports—a smoothly running project offers fewer openings for interference. Vanishers are particularly impacted by regular communications, especially if their name is included on the list of people with outstanding action items (approval requests) or overdue resources (additional funding).
Managing expectations is key when dealing with difficult stakeholders. You’ll need to look at the partnership from two sides to get the best effect—what the stakeholder can reasonably expect from you, and what your team will be expecting from the stakeholder. Setting clear expectations around what your team’s obligations are will keep empire builders and bossers from steamrolling you, while aggressively pursuing the support you expect to receive from name droppers and vanishers will be critical to keeping your project on track.
Setting deadlines for support and/or information keeps your team from getting down to the wire, only to discover they’re missing vital resources that are necessary to successfully complete the project. Name droppers and vanishers will more reliably hold up their end of the bargain if there’s a formal deadline for them to deliver the support and/or resources they initially promised. Bossers are less likely to interfere with the team’s project activities when clear deadlines have been set, since it keeps you on the controlling end of the relationship.
Establishing limits on what your team will do—and when they can do it—is a good way to keep empire builders from becoming overbearing. Outlining your Project Team’s boundaries early in the process not only gives prospective empire builders some solid obstacles to overcome should they consider taking charge, it will also provide your team with concrete ways to push back if they’re challenged. Advise your team to be vigilant, since empire builders are likely to become more aggressive if they think you’ve let down your guard.
Empowering your team is a surefire way to keep nightmare stakeholders in line. Name droppers and vanishers are rendered powerless when routinely confronted by team members about promised resources, making them more likely to follow through on their commitments. Empire builders and bossers also tend to abandon self-serving activities when they consistently meet resistance from individual Project Team members. Create signature limits that are as high as you can reasonably make them and spread authorization responsibilities among several members, so your team is less reliant on difficult stakeholders for urgent approvals.
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