The Art of Stakeholder Management
These 5 steps will help you engage your stakeholders and manage the varying (and competing) expectations of the people interested in your project. Find out why communication is the best thing you can do.
Author: Elizabeth Harrin
Elizabeth Harrin is a Fellow of the Association for Project Management in the UK. She holds degrees from the University of York and Roehampton University, and several project management certifications including APM PMQ. She first took her PRINCE2 Practitioner exam in 2004 and has worked extensively in project delivery for over 20 years.
Elizabeth is also the founder of the Project Management Rebels community, a mentoring group for professionals. She's written several books for project managers including Managing Multiple Projects.
Best PMI-ACP Study Guides
Short on time? The best PMI-ACP exam prep book is PMI-ACP Exam Prep by Mike Griffiths. You’re here because you are planning to take your PMI Agile Certified Professional (PMI-ACP)® exam. Well, you’re in the right place! As well as a PMI-ACP training course, the most successful students also include a study guide in their…
Best PMI-ACP Exam Prep Books
Short on time? Pick one book to supplement your PMI-ACP studies. I would suggest it’s User Stories Applied: For Agile Software Development by Mike Cohn. Are you aiming to achieve your PMI Agile Certified Professional (PMI-ACP)®? The most successful students also include reading a range of PMI-ACP books in their exam prep, as well as…
How I Do It: Communication Tools & Tips
Find out how I manage project stakeholder communications on my projects. These are my tried-and-tested techniques. Are there ideas here that you could use on your projects? Let me know if you put my tips into action!
What are the relevant factors that drive or result from information overload?
Thomas asked this question during the PMI Learning, Education and Development Community of Practice presentation I gave about Collaboration Tools for Project Managers. We were talking about using social media tools at work for communication and collaboration, and – of course – the topic of information overload came up. Normally I’m asked how to deal…
6 Barriers to customer centricity
This is an edited extract from Customer-Centric Project Management by Elizabeth Harrin and Phil Peplow (Gower/Routledge, 2012). It would be great to think that project-based organizations and PMOs would jump at the opportunity to improve stakeholder engagement and project communication by demonstrating customer centricity (not sure what that is in the context of project management?…
What Project Managers really need to know about leadership
This is a guest post by Martin Webster from The Lazy Leader. Search for project management training on Google and you’ll find lots of courses on the topic. Many refer to APMP, MSP®, PRINCE2® or even agile project management. What most have in common is an emphasis on project management accreditation, project planning, risk management,…
Susanne Madsen on Project Leadership [Interview]
When I read Susanne Madsen’s book, The Power of Project Leadership. I was struck by how practical it was. Often we think that leadership is about character and attitude (read my take on the traits of good leaders here) and forget that you can actually practice being a better leader by coaching yourself in the…
How To Recover troubled programs (part 2)
Are you seeing any of the problems faced by troubled programs? If so, you need a recovery plan to get your program back on track. Here’s the 5 step ESI process for getting out of trouble — I saw a webinar hosted by them and these are my notes. The whole approach assumes you have…
Project Management and Leadership – can you have one without the other?
This is a guest post by Andy Trainer of Silicon Beach Training. Project management is a field that is becoming increasingly valued within both large and small organizations – our project management training has never been so much in demand! It’s now widely recognized that having employees with great project management skills leads to more…
How To Recover troubled programmes (part 1)
There’s only one thing worse than being told bad news, and that is being told about bad news late. When a program is failing, you should define the problem and potential solutions, and alert stakeholders at the first sign of trouble, according to LeRoy Ward, Executive VP at ESI. I attended ‘Managing and Saving Programs…
Understanding Leadership
Leadership – what does it really mean for you? Find out how to lead when things are going well, and how to lead through a crisis in this article.