PROJECT INITIATION
PHASE
PART-II
Instructor: Rizwan Rasheed
Key Discussions
Developing a Business Case
Running a Feasibility Study
Developing a Project Charter
Enlisting & Managing Stakeholders
Selecting the right team & Project Office
Putting the Finishing Touches/Review
Enlisting & Managing Stakeholders
“A stakeholder is anyone who either affects or is affected by the project or
its deliverables.”
“Anyone who has a vested interest in the outcome of a project.”
Prioritizing Stakeholders
Managing stakeholders does not have to be difficult, but it does take some
effort. It begins with identifying the individual stakeholders, which you can
do by asking three basic questions:
1. Who benefits from the project?
2. Who contributes to the project?
3. Who is impacted by the project?
Enlisting & Managing Stakeholders
Enlisting & Managing Stakeholders
1. Identify Stakeholders
Identify Stakeholders is the process of identifying project
stakeholders regularly and analyzing and documenting relevant
information regarding their interests, involvement,
interdependencies, influence, and potential impact on project success.
The key benefit of this process is that it enables the project team to
identify the appropriate focus for engagement of each stakeholder or
group of stakeholders.
This process is performed periodically throughout the project as
needed.
Managing Stakeholders
Stakeholder Grid/ Power-Interest
Matrix or Grid
“A power-interest grid is a
technique used to categorize
stakeholders based on their power
or influence and interest in a
project. Before using the technique,
you should identify all stakeholders
involved in the project.”
Managing Stakeholders
• High power - High interest: these are the stakeholders are decision makers and
have the biggest impact on the project success and hence you must closely
manage their expectations.
• High power - Low Interest: these are the stakeholder needed to be kept in loop,
these stakeholders need to be kept satisfied even though they aren’t interested
because they yield power. These type of stakeholders should be dealt with
cautiously as well since they may use their power in a not desired way in the
project if they become unsatisfied.
• Low power – High interest: keep these people adequately informed, and talk to
them to ensure that no major issues are arising. These people can often be very
helpful with the detail of your project.
• Low power - low interest: monitor these people, but do not bore them with
excessive communication.
Managing Stakeholders
The Stakeholder
Engagement Assessment
Matrix is a simple yet
powerful project
management technique to
document desired and
monitor actual engagement
levels of stakeholders. It
helps identify potential
gaps in the involvement of
stakeholders.
Managing Stakeholders
In the figure, Stakeholder 1 is unaware, and you want him to be supportive.
You have some work to do.
Stakeholder 2 is neutral, and you want him to be supportive. Perhaps you have
a short meeting or a cup of coffee and try to move him to support your project.
Stakeholder 3 is already supportive. This is obviously good news, and he will
require little or no effort moving forward. You can check periodically to make
sure he remains happy.
Be proactive and maximize stakeholder involvement. Invest the time and effort
necessary to create a stakeholders engagement assessment matrix. In the rush
of the typical project environment, it is always useful to have a simple matrix
to rely on. Keep it current!
Managing Stakeholders
Stakeholder Register
“A stakeholder register is a
document that describes
who (individual or group) is
affected by a project, and
their effect and impact on
the project. ”
Managing Stakeholders
Stakeholder Alignment and
Communication
The stakeholders have varying
levels of technical expertise and
product/ project knowledge. To
get everyone moving in the
same direction and thereby
maximize interaction, gauge
their overall experience and
project knowledge levels.
Appointing the Project team & Project Office
Assembling a working project team and assigning them roles and
responsibilities is a vital part of the project initiation phase.
Assigning roles and responsibilities early on also increases the overall
accountability of the entire team and can help you as a manager in the later
phases of the project life cycle.
Although a project manager may be appointed at any stage during the life of
the project, the manager will ideally be appointed prior to recruiting the project
team.
The project manager creates a detailed job description for each role in the
project team, and recruits people into each role based on their relevant skills
and experience
Establishing a Project Office
The project office is the physical environment within which the team is based.
Although it is usual to have one central project office, it is possible to have a
virtual project office with project team members located around the world. A
project office environment should include:
Equipment, such as office furniture, computer equipment, stationery and
materials;
Communications infrastructure, such as telephones, computer network, e mail,
Internet access, file storage, database storage and backup facilities;
Documentation, such as a project methodology, standards, processes, forms and
registers;
Tools, such as accounting, project planning and risk modeling software.
Final Review
“At the end of the initiation phase, perform a phase
review. This is basically a checkpoint to ensure that
the project has achieved its objectives as planned.”
Key Topics Discussed
Enlisting & Managing Stakeholders
Selecting the right team & Project Office
Putting the Finishing Touches/Review
Key Activities
Stakeholder Grid/ Power-Interest Matrix or Grid
Stakeholder Engagement Assessment Matrix
Stakeholder Register
References
• A guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) Sixth
Edition by PMI
• Fundamentals of Project Management (Fifth Edition) by Joseph Heagney
• https://kissflow.com/project/project-initiation/
• Project Management by Dr. B. Charumathi, Associate Professor, Dept. of
Management Studies, Pondicherry University, Puducherry.
The End
