Stakeholder Maps feature a lot in any kind of strategic analysis and we’ve used them in Sales Development as well for Personal Branding and Networking Sessions. Little did I know that my own children were deploying this tool in our family!
Most maps use similar parameters such as:
Importance
- A person can be High Importance. They’re a decision maker, or they are so close to the decision maker that they are effectively the decision maker.
- They can be of Moderate Importance, when they are an influencer, they have some input. But they, themselves, will not make that decision.
- Or they can be of Low Importance but potentially useful. They have information, they have intel, they know what’s going on. You can use them to find out what’s happening in the company.
Influence
- Are they Negative? Are they against you? Not only will they not vote for you, they’ll vote against you. They’ll say, “I’m not sure they’re the right people.”
- Are they Neutral? Prove it either way. No favour, no prejudice
- Are they Positive? They will actually support you and make your case?
An Example (with my family!)
In our family decision making can be fairly complex and outdo many corporates for the degree of political agility required to push something through.
My youngest daughter sees the world very simply:
- Dad tends to say yes because he wants to be the apple of his daughters eyes and doesn’t think thing through too much.
- Mum is more in touch with events in the field and knows what the limiting factors might be so tends to err on the side of caution.
- Big Sis has some sway but could easily block if the decision favours Little Sis unfairly.
So the Stakeholder Map looks like this:
What to do?
It’s very tempting to secure a yes from Dad and then pitch this to Mum. We all know where that ends.
A direct pitch to Mum can result in “we’ll see” which in child world means “never going to happen”.
Big Sis is the key.
Get her on side and, by virtue of experience, she knows how Mum works and what the issues might be.
With Big Sis on board, Dad will be easy to recruit and then Mum can feel comfortable saying yes.
Conclusion
Don’t give your children access to the dark arts of influence and persuasion as they will learn very fast and apply them better than anyone you have ever trained…
I hope you found that tool helpful. If you think that techniques like this could, say, help your teams get better results, get in touch and let Sun and Moon help you out.
David Solomon
Managing Director, Sun and Moon Training
@SunMoonDavid
Photo copyright: Darya Petrenko / 123RF Stock Photo