Abbott Project Management Playbook

Some of these stakeholders may have the power either to block that work or to advance the project. Some may be interested in what you are doing, while others may not care, so the Project Manager needs to determine priorities. The power/interest grid maps out your stakeholders and classifies them according to their power over your work and their interest in it.

The position that you allocate to a stakeholder on the grid shows you the actions you need to take with them. The table below exemplifies each scenario.

Some questions will assist you when allocating each stakeholder in one of these four quadrants and on identifying which ones your key stakeholders are, such as: • What financial or emotional interest do they have in the outcome of your work? Positive or negative? • What information do they want from you, and what is the best way of communicating with them? • Who influences their opinions generally, and who influences their opinion of you? • If they aren’t likely to be positive, what will win them around to support your project?

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