Concept 3 of 4

Stakeholder communications

4 questions test this

Stakeholder Communications sits in the Planning category next to Requirements and Use Scenarios, and Pragmatic Institute names it as one of the three framework activities examined in the Build course. Its wording specifies two things that do most of the work, proactive, and from strategy through execution.

Proactive means on a schedule

Communication that happens in response to a question has already failed twice. It reached only the person who asked, and it arrived after they had begun to worry.

A rhythm fixes both. A short written update on a fixed cadence, published whether or not there is news, means nobody has to ask and everybody gets the same version. It also removes the incentive to escalate, because escalation stops being the fastest route to information.

The discipline is to keep publishing when the news is dull. An update that appears only when something interesting happens becomes a signal in itself.

From strategy through execution

The framework covers the whole span deliberately. Stakeholders who only see execution updates get progress with no context and evaluate it against whatever they assume the goal is.

Three layers, on different cadences, cover it.

Why this direction. The market evidence and the decision it supports. Repeated periodically, because people forget and because new people arrive.

What is committed and when. The release plan, with what changed since last time.

What is in flight and what has landed. Short, specific, and including what was dropped and why.

Different stakeholders, different framing

A support director wants to know what will change in their queue and when to train for it. A sales lead wants to know what can be said to a customer today. An executive wants the outcome against the plan and the two risks that could change it. A development team wants the market context that explains why the order is what it is.

The facts underneath are the same. Sending everyone the same document means most of them have to extract their own answer, and most of them will not.

Development as a stakeholder audience

Build treats the development team as an audience for market knowledge rather than only as a recipient of requirements. Increasing their market knowledge is listed alongside building trust and safety as what makes a team effective. A team that knows who the user is and what the problem costs them will make better decisions in the hundred places nobody wrote a requirement for.

When something goes wrong

Early, specific and with options. What has changed, what it affects, what the choices are, and what you recommend. Stakeholders forgive slippage that arrives with a decision to make. They remember slippage that arrives as a completed fact.

Common misconceptions

Stakeholders are informed when they ask.

The framework word is proactive. Communication that only happens on request arrives late, arrives to whoever asked loudest, and trains the organisation that escalation is how you find things out.

One status update serves everyone.

A support director needs to know what changes for their queue, an executive needs the outcome against the plan, and a sales lead needs what can be said to customers. The underlying facts are shared and the framing is not.

Bad news should wait until there is a solution to present with it.

Delay is what damages trust, not the news. A slip communicated early with the options still open is a planning conversation. The same slip communicated late is a surprise, and surprises are what make stakeholders start asking for detail they never wanted before.

4 questions test this concept

The framework specifies proactive communications with relevant stakeholders. What does proactive rule out?

  • ACommunication that happens in response to a question, since it reaches only the person who asked and arrives after they have begun to worry, which teaches the organisation that escalation is how you find things out
  • BWritten updates, since proactive implies conversation
  • CUpdates that contain bad news
  • DCommunicating with stakeholders outside the immediate product team
Check whether it stuck.

One per page, with a worked explanation.

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