Identifying and managing the relationship with stakeholders will be a key factor in the success of any organization. But what are stakeholders, after all, and what is their importance?
Meaning “interested parties”, stakeholders are crucial for any organization and its success. But what are they, anyway? When we talk about stakeholders, we are referring to the organizations and people that, somehow, can impact or can be impacted by our organizations and their actions. Therefore, it becomes obvious the need to know who your stakeholders are. There are different ways to classify them.
On one hand, we can talk about internal stakeholders when we refer to groups of people intrinsic to the company’s environment. On the other hand, the external stakeholders are those we can find outside the environment of a company, but with which it interacts. When we talk about the type of impact that these stakeholders can have, we talk about direct stakeholders, if they are directly impacted by the company, or, on the other hand, we talk about indirect stakeholders if they are indirectly impacted by the organization’s actions.
We give you some examples of stakeholders:
- Internal stakeholders
- Employees
- Shareholders
- Company managers
- External stakeholders
- Suppliers
- Competitors
- The State
- Media
- Customers
- Unions
- Media
It is crucial that in your organization, depending on the action that is going to take place, stakeholders are then mapped. How to do it?
- Start by listing all possible groups, people, and organizations that may be impacted in some way by your organization;
- Define, for each stakeholder identified, the interests and needs that characterize it;
- Classify, by order of importance, every stakeholder.
This way, you will be able to have, in an overview, all the stakeholders of your organization, their interests, and their needs, guaranteeing a greater probability of success.
Communicate with stakeholders
It is not enough to know what stakeholders are and how to identify them. In managing your relationship with them, keep in mind that communication, which is always a crucial factor, must also be considered:
- Ensure that you communicate constantly and transparently with your stakeholders, as your organization may have an impact on them;
- Adapt communication to each stakeholder as each has different interests and needs. Therefore, you must adapt the messages, the communication channels, the used tone, among others;
- Try to get feedback from your stakeholders, identifying any specific problems that may arise, as you will be able to resolve any situations more quickly and more effectively.
Stakeholders are crucial to a company’s success. Do not forget to identify them, and, more than that, to consider and communicate with them since a positive relationship with your stakeholders can be the way to achieve success more easily.
By Sofia Neves, press officer in Media em Movimento
Sources: