A colleague and I were taking the 10000th person through our project process and progress, and we were trying to articulate our stakeholder engagement philosophy, when it occurred to me why it had gone so well to date.
Normally, a project like the large online project we ran usually ends up with the standard ‘design by committee’ outcome, or struggles to avoid it but somehow can’t avoid it. What we’ve managed to do with this project is engage dozens of people, help them understand the change we’re undertaking, and let them leave the briefing feeling like they’re across the process, and even support the decisions we’ve made and give ongoing support.
So we’ve been able to own the process yet share the outcome.
Controlling the way the project is run is different to allowing all to understand and support this control, and even be involved in the decision making process. This has been a unique benefit that you should strive for in your project – it creates an efficient and focussed outcome.
