Stakeholders’ involvement in a project is key and strategic. Projects must ensure that all stakeholders are identified regardless of the time allocated, and guarantee their integration.
Integration ensures that the needs and expectations of all stakeholders are properly understood to enable the project product definition and design. Integration is an essential process since it:
> Enables the project team members to work according to their expertise, ensuring the final product quality.
> Is directly related to the notion of teamwork and respect among all the team members, whereby everyone works with a common goal, ensuring proper functioning and effective communication based on solidarity and group cohesion.
For an effective integration, the project must be based on two major pillars: grouping and management.
> Grouping classifies stakeholders according to their specialty expertise and the role assigned in the project to expedite management. For example, Executive, Business, Project Manager, Project Team, Other.
> Management consolidates stakeholders’ involvement and goals achievement based on grouping.
Project stakeholders drive the project development by communicating their expectations and needs to define the objectives and the product, service or result to be delivered as the project output. Based on each specialty and the role defined according to the grouping, stakeholders must actively participate during the project, especially those who are knowledgeable on the business to which the product, service or result is related to.
From a broader perspective, projects that identify all their stakeholders and achieve integration based on the major pillars, will be effective and more likely to meet their objectives.