Stakeholder Meeting Musts

Kenneth has 14 years of healthcare experience in government and private industry. Over eight years of experience managing healthcare IT projects, operations, contracts, and personnel. His work experience includes project management, contracts and procurements, data analysis, claims adjudication, business writing, and business process modeling. Kenneth was certified in 2006 as a Project Management Professional.

  Communications Management   Stakeholder Management  

Stakeholders can be the key to a successful project if they are engaged in the project and willing and able to make a positive impact. In order to engage the stakeholders, you will need to meet with them and facilitate their understanding of the project and what is needed for it to be successful.

The heart of these meetings is your ability to relate to the stakeholders and communicate with them. A successful meeting with stakeholders can lead to funding, resources and a lot of other gains for the project. A successful relationship with stakeholders can get a project off the ground or rescue a failing project.

Setting the Stage
The first step in dealing with stakeholders is to set the stage correctly. While project management is not smoke and mirrors or acting in a play, you need to give some thought to how the project is perceived by others. If you show up to a meeting without being fully prepared or if you are not ready to lay out the roadmap of the project, then you are not going to be able to fully engage stakeholders with the project.

In order to set the stage, you need to have a full understanding of the project and how the stakeholders are related to it. Then you need to do the work to prepare communication in an effective manner. This holds true whether the stakeholder is an end user of the system being built or the CEO of the customer’s organization.

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