Conduct a stakeholder analysis by defining who counts for your project, identifying affected and influential people or organizations, documenting what each needs and wants, prioritizing attention, and converting the findings into owned engagement actions. Revisit the analysis whenever the project, operating context, or stakeholder positions change.
What a stakeholder analysis is—and what it is for
A stakeholder analysis is a structured way to understand everyone who can affect a project, is affected by it, or has a relevant interest in its outcome. The useful output is not a decorative list or a one-time matrix. It is a decision aid: it helps the team decide whom to involve, when to involve them, what to ask for, what to communicate, and which concerns belong in risk, scope, design, or change plans.
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Stakeholders may be individuals, groups, businesses, public bodies, community organizations, suppliers, workers and their representatives, customers, intended beneficiaries, or other organizations connected to the work. An organization chart is only a starting point; informal relationships and trusted influencers can determine whether a change succeeds.
When to start and how to set the scope
Start after objectives are clear
Begin once the project’s objectives and broad boundaries are set. Without that context, the team cannot judge who is affected, what influence means, or which information is relevant.
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Define inclusion rules before collecting names
Write a short scope statement answering:
- What project, decision, product, or change is being analyzed?
- Which geography, business units, time period, and delivery partners are included?
- Will the list cover current and potential stakeholders?
- What threshold justifies inclusion—for example, material impact, decision authority, legal duty, operational dependency, or credible ability to block or enable progress?
- Will stakeholders be grouped by role, sector, shared need, behavior, or another useful category?
These rules prevent the list from becoming either an unmanageable directory or a narrow list of senior contacts.
Step 1: Build a broad, systematic stakeholder list
Invite colleagues who already work with relevant communities, customers, regulators, suppliers, staff, or partner organizations. Use several prompts rather than relying on memory:
- Who will be directly affected by the project’s outputs, process, cost, risk, or timing?
- Who may be indirectly affected through customers, workers, communities, services, or the environment?
- Who is interested in the work or concerned about its consequences?
- Who has formal authority, resources, expertise, social legitimacy, or informal influence?
- Who supplies a critical input or controls a dependency?
- Who represents affected people, including unions, advocacy groups, civil-society organizations, or community leaders?
- Which government bodies, funders, owners, partners, or oversight groups have a role?
Record groups as well as named individuals. A group can later be represented by several contacts, while a named person may change roles.
Step 2: Record what you need to know about each stakeholder
Use a working register that separates observed facts from assumptions. The following fields cover the questions most engagement plans require:
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Rank #2
| Field | What to record |
|---|---|
| Stakeholder or group | Name, category, and representative contacts where appropriate |
| Role and relationship | How the stakeholder connects to the project, including formal duties and dependencies |
| Interests and needs | Desired outcomes, constraints, values, incentives, and non-negotiable requirements |
| Expectations and concerns | What the stakeholder believes will happen, plus objections, risks, or unanswered questions |
| Impact or affectedness | How strongly the project may change the stakeholder’s work, rights, costs, access, safety, or benefits |
| Influence or power | Ability to authorize, fund, delay, shape, implement, challenge, or legitimize the work |
| Position and commitment | Current support, neutrality, opposition, or uncertainty, with evidence and confidence noted |
| Relationships | Alliances, dependencies, conflicts, trusted intermediaries, and informal political flows |
| Information and participation needs | What the stakeholder needs to know, decide, review, test, approve, or co-design |
| Engagement owner and next action | Named person responsible, action, timing, channel, intended outcome, and tracking method |
Do not substitute the project team’s priorities for a stakeholder’s interests. Confirm important assumptions through interviews, existing relationship owners, records, or direct participation.
Step 3: Choose a mapping approach that supports a decision
Select the map according to the decision it must support. A simple grid is useful for comparison, but no single diagram captures impact, relationships, urgency, legitimacy, and commitment at once.
| Approach | Best use | What it shows | Limitation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Power/influence–interest grid | Quickly decide contact intensity | Relative influence and interest | Can hide affectedness, relationships, and uncertainty |
| Influence–commitment map | Plan sponsorship or change adoption | Who can influence the work and who is willing to support it | Commitment can change and may be difficult to observe reliably |
| Affectedness–influence map | Protect people who bear consequences but lack authority | Impact on stakeholders alongside their ability to shape decisions | Requires a clear definition of impact |
| Relationship or network map | Understand informal power and coalition dynamics | Connections, trust, dependencies, and political flows | More time-consuming and sensitive to share |
| Tracked engagement plan | Run a changing project over time | Actions, owners, dates, responses, and unresolved issues | Needs disciplined maintenance rather than a one-time workshop |
Use a four-quadrant grid as a starting point
Plot each stakeholder’s assessed influence and interest, then discuss the placement with people who know the context. Treat ratings as working judgments, not precise measurements. Add a note for affectedness, urgency, legitimacy, confidence, or commitment whenever that information would change the action.
| Quadrant | Typical intent | Questions to answer |
|---|---|---|
| High influence, high interest | Manage closely | What decisions, trade-offs, and regular forums require their active involvement? |
| High influence, lower interest | Keep satisfied | What concise assurance, milestone, or escalation path prevents surprise? |
| Lower influence, high interest | Keep informed and listen | How will their experience, concerns, and local knowledge reach decisions? |
| Lower influence, lower interest | Monitor proportionately | What trigger would require more contact or a different level of participation? |
Do not let the quadrant label dictate a fixed communication script. A person with little formal power may represent a legally protected or heavily affected group, and a low-interest executive may become decisive after a risk or deadline changes.
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Prioritization directs limited engagement time; it is not a judgment about whose interests matter. Agree the criteria and document why a rating was assigned.
- Influence: Can the stakeholder enable, constrain, approve, fund, delay, or redirect the work?
- Interest: How closely does the outcome affect the stakeholder’s goals or responsibilities?
- Affectedness: How significant are the likely benefits, burdens, risks, or rights implications?
- Urgency: Is there a time-sensitive decision, harm, dependency, or window for participation?
- Legitimacy: Does the stakeholder have a recognized claim, duty, mandate, or representative role?
- Commitment and confidence: What is the current position, and how certain is the evidence?
Use a simple scale your team can apply consistently, such as low, medium, and high. Record the reasoning and the source of important information. Revisit disputed ratings in a facilitated discussion rather than presenting them as objective scores.
Step 5: Turn the analysis into an engagement plan
For every priority stakeholder, write an action that could be scheduled and checked. A useful plan contains:
- Intended outcome: Define the decision, understanding, support, information, or design input you need.
- Participation level: Choose informing, consulting, involving, collaborating, negotiating, or decision-making as appropriate to the stakeholder and the project’s authority.
- Owner: Assign one accountable person, even when several colleagues help.
- Method and channel: Select a meeting, interview, workshop, site visit, survey, briefing, written response, or representative forum.
- Timing and cadence: Link contact to decisions, milestones, operational changes, or escalation triggers—not merely a recurring calendar invite.
- Feedback loop: Explain how input will be assessed, what changed, what did not change, and why.
- Record and escalation: Track commitments, unresolved concerns, response dates, owners, and conditions that require project-board or risk-register action.
Example engagement-plan entry
| Stakeholder | Need or concern | Action | Owner and timing | Evidence of progress |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Front-line service representatives | Workflow disruption and accessibility concerns | Run a scenario workshop, test a pilot, and publish responses to issues raised | Change lead; workshop before design sign-off, pilot before rollout | Issue log, decision record, pilot findings, and agreed changes |
Engagement is not complete when a meeting occurs. It is complete when the project has recorded the response and made clear how the contribution affected—or did not affect—the decision.
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Stakeholder maps become outdated as scope, leadership, operations, risks, and public attention change. Review the register at planned points and after:
- a change in objectives, scope, schedule, funding, or operating model;
- a new dependency, incident, complaint, regulation, or public concern;
- a change in stakeholder role, position, influence, or coalition;
- unexpected resistance, support, or implementation difficulty;
- the arrival or departure of key personnel.
The World Bank’s Environmental and Social Management System Toolkit, Version 2.0 (August 2025), recommends review at least annually or whenever operations change significantly in its business context. Other projects may need weekly or milestone-based reviews.
For each update, record what changed, the evidence, the date, and the resulting engagement action. Limit access to sensitive assessments, especially comments about political relationships, personal circumstances, or perceived opposition. Share only what people need to perform their role, and use professional judgment about storage, distribution, and retention.
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- Listing only senior managers: Add affected communities, front-line workers, representatives, suppliers, regulators, and informal influencers.
- Copying the organization chart: Map relationships, trust, dependencies, and routes through which information or resistance travels.
- Treating the matrix as fact: Label ratings as assessments, state confidence, and invite challenge.
- Confusing communication with engagement: Specify what stakeholders can influence and how responses will be handled.
- Using one axis for every decision: Add affectedness, urgency, legitimacy, commitment, or relationship data when those dimensions alter the plan.
- Creating a map with no owner: Attach every priority action to a named person, date, outcome, and tracking record.
- Leaving the map unchanged: Schedule reviews and update it after material project or stakeholder changes.
- Sharing sensitive judgments widely: Control access and separate factual records from interpretations that require careful handling.
A compact stakeholder-analysis worksheet
Copy these columns into a spreadsheet or collaboration tool:
Best Value
- Stakeholder or group
- Category and representative
- Role and relationship to the project
- Interests, needs, and expectations
- Concerns, risks, and likely impact
- Influence or power
- Interest
- Commitment or current position
- Urgency and legitimacy (if relevant)
- Key relationships and dependencies
- Information or participation needed
- Priority and rationale
- Engagement outcome sought
- Method, timing, and cadence
- Owner
- Feedback, decision, and issue status
- Last reviewed, next review, and change reason
Use the simplest version that supports the decisions your team must make. A complex project may need a register, relationship diagram, and engagement tracker rather than one overloaded graphic.
How to tell whether the analysis is useful
A practical quality check is whether the analysis changes project behavior. You should be able to point from a stakeholder entry to a decision, an engagement action, an owner, and a recorded response. If the map cannot explain why someone is involved, what they can influence, how they are affected, or what happens next, revise the entry or remove it.
Frequently Asked Questions
How often should a stakeholder analysis be updated?
Review it at planned project milestones and whenever objectives, operations, risks, key personnel, or stakeholder positions change. For its business context, the World Bank ESMS Toolkit, Version 2.0 (August 2025), recommends at least annual review and review after significant operational change.
Is a power-interest grid enough?
It is an accessible starting point, but it may miss affectedness, urgency, legitimacy, commitment, and informal relationships. Add dimensions or a relationship map when those factors would change your engagement decisions.
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