Introducing: The Influencer

In the first iterations of creating and naming the Product Owner stances, we weren’t sure about the Influencer. We originally called this stance the Politician. We felt that Influencer might be linked more to being an online influencer, as in social media platforms. The Product Owner as an influencer, however, is somebody who influences people inside and outside the company to move the product or service in the right direction. When doing so, they often run into company politics, which is why we thought Politician was appropriate for this stance. Feedback taught us that people felt offended to be called a politician. Most product people told us that they did not want to take part in corporate politics. Clearly, politician held negative connotations for many people. We consequently focused more on the ability to influence others, and that’s when we found the right stance: the Influencer.

Not all (Product Owner) Influencers are the same. Here are some positive outcomes and benefits that we have observed when Product Owners take the Influencer stance:

• Great Influencers can build a united force, having a positive impact on organizational effectiveness. Inspired by a strong vision, Influencers manage to achieve buy-in among people and bring them together. Influencers build up energy and make change happen. They inspire others and align them to work toward a shared goal.

• They gain better alignment and buy-in among stakeholders, customers, users, and teams around a shared vision, strategy, and approach. Their teams and stakeholders try to have a positive contribution and actively support the product to become successful.

• Having a great Influencer results in fewer arguments, delays of decisions, political games, power struggles, and other forms of negative and wasted energy that slow down the development process.

There are trade-offs to be made when influencing other people. Some Influencers use rational approaches to influencing people. These Influencers focus on the facts, figures, and data, and they use logic and reasoning to persuade their stakeholders. They may legitimize choices, exchange, and barter or simply state their beliefs. This way of influencing people may work well. It does require a good foundation in the relationship you have with others, though. A good relationship and mutual trust should often be in place already. Socializing, appealing to that relationship, consulting others, and even alliance-building can help the influencer to make the arguments stick.

Some Influencer Product Owners take a different approach. They appeal to values that may be their own or the company’s values. They might be the Scrum Values or other belief systems in the organization, or they may be the beliefs of the person being influenced. For example, one of the core values at our company is Quality Without Compromise. This means that we always focus on good quality products and services. If this is one of your company’s values, then you can argue with any stakeholder against some of the strongest rational arguments simply because quality shouldn’t be compromised. If people were to compromise on quality, they would be conflicting with the core values of the company. In a way, the Product Owner is a role model. The Product Owner can influence people by exhibiting values and behaviors such as openness, focus, commitment, courage, and respect.

Of course, there is also a way to influence people through emotions. Although it may not seem like a wise strategy up front, we’ve seen some cases where it helped to be functionally angry. It sometimes helps to get feedback from a critical stakeholder, who is angry or disappointed for a good reason. It may sometimes help you, as a Product Owner, to be angry or disappointed and to voice those feelings—of course, while remaining respectful to others.

What great Influencers do:

• Be honest. Always. What some great Product Owners and product managers do so well is to always be open, honest, and transparent. Being honest can sometimes be difficult because it makes people vulnerable. It reveals who they are and discloses their mistakes, which allows others to criticize or reject them openly. However, being honest develops character and builds credibility and trust, which are the foundation to evoke confidence and respect from others.

• They are compassionate. Compassion is the quality of understanding the suffering of others and wanting to do something about it. While many see compassion as a weakness, true compassion is a characteristic that converts knowledge to wisdom. Great leaders use compassion to discover the needs of those they lead and then to determine the next steps to take.

• They are flexible and great listeners. Flexibility is about understanding the give-and-take aspects of politics. It’s about understanding the various interests in the company. And it’s about the ability to find common ground. Great Influencers listen carefully to the interests, goals, and objectives of all parties. They not only hear all arguments, they also try to learn from the various viewpoints what it will take on behalf of all parties involved to reach a consensus. These skills allow Influencers to recognize setbacks and criticism, to learn from them, and then to move on.

• Share the credit, take the blame. Good leaders take a little more than their share of the blame and a little less than their share of the credit. This is how Arnold H. Glasow described a core quality of great leaders. Great Product Owners give the credit to their teams and stakeholders for building a great product. They take the blame when it fails. In the end, it’s all about taking responsibility.

• They are great network builders. Great influencers move beyond the awareness of the stakeholder playing field and create specific strategies to proactively seek help from stakeholders and rally them to their cause. For example, rather than relying only on Sprint Review to craft a path forward, they massage critical stakeholders and avoid surprises.

• They can bend reality. Great Influencers seem to bend the perception of reality. For example, if a stakeholder disagrees with the direction of the product, the Influencer can get the stakeholder to argue in favor of the Influencer’s own case by asking, “What might go wrong if we don’t do this?” Or if the stakeholder is hesitant to align with the Product Owner’s strategy, the Influencer Product Owner might ask, “What additional benefits would we receive from this strategy?”

• They are familiar with the word no! Perhaps the defining quality of a great influencer is their ability to say no. Handling the resistance that comes from not getting your way and without getting your ego bruised is what makes great Influencers shine.

Other techniques that influence people—which we encourage you never to use—are manipulation, intimidation, avoidance, and threats. When we see these techniques used by a character in, say, a good thriller movie, we immediately recognize the character as a villain. In real life, such tactics have the same effect. They are antithetic to great product ownership.

In the remainder of this chapter, we explore various techniques for identifying stakeholders, how to create a stakeholder management strategy, different types of stakeholders, and how to say no to them effectively.

Let’s start at the start: What is a stakeholder anyway?

Definition of Stakeholder

Every Product Owner and product manager must deal with stakeholders, which means also doing stakeholder management. After all, Product Owners are making a product with and for other people. As a Product Owner, you will need to deal with different types of stakeholders, both inside and outside your organization. But what are stakeholders? Who are your stakeholders? How should you deal with them? This is what we uncover in this chapter.

There are many different definitions of stakeholder, and a lot of overlap exists between those definitions. Let’s start with a simple one. If you define stakeholder from a Professional Scrum perspective, it’s simple: everybody outside the Scrum Team is (potentially) a stakeholder.

This definition is so simple from a Professional Scrum perspective because the Scrum framework describes only three accountabilities, or roles if you will: Product Owner, Scrum Master, and Developers. No other roles or accountabilities are defined, basically meaning that each individual will be part of the Scrum Team or else they will be a stakeholder—and thus outside the Scrum Team. To emphasize that the Scrum Team is in this together, Professional Scrum theory doesn’t describe the stakeholder as a separate accountability or role. What we often find in practice though, is that Product Owners consider their Scrum Team as a stakeholder. To us, this doesn’t make much sense, because you’re one Scrum Team, together. It may feel like there is work to be done in building trust in the Scrum Team, surely. However, you shouldn’t need a stakeholder map and communication strategy for your own Scrum Team. Rather than managing and strategizing in the Scrum Team, focus on building trust through collaboration. Focus on building a great product, together.

There are also other and more comprehensive definitions of stakeholder. An alternative definition of the term stakeholder is found in Schuurman and Vermaak’s Master the Art of No:¹

1. Robbin Schuurman and Willem Vermaak, Master the Art of No: Effective Stakeholder Management for Product Owners and Product Managers, independently published, 2020.

Stakeholders are individuals, groups of individuals, corporations, or authorities who have a direct or indirect interest (a stake) in the organization, its products, and/or services. Stakeholders can be internal or external to the organization.

These definitions imply that as a Product Owner, you must deal with a wide variety of stakeholders. From development to marketing, from finance to supply chain, from legal to operations, from sales to management, many people may have a stake in your product or service. Some of those stakeholders are easily identified. For example, think of (potential) customers and users. These stakeholders have a clear interest in your product or service (after all, these are the people who will purchase and/or use it). Other easily identified stakeholders may be some of your colleagues or the managers of other departments. Managers may have an interest in your product or service from a sales, cost, marketing, development, or management perspective. Colleagues may be involved in the creation, delivery, marketing, or servicing of the product.

Besides the obvious stakeholders, there are usually groups of stakeholders who are easily overlooked because they are difficult to identify. These are groups of stakeholders who seem to have no obvious interest, or only little interest, in your product or service. Examples of such stakeholders might include government agencies, social organizations, or the press and media. Of course, their interest depends greatly on your context. Another example might include a manager from another business unit or department, who seems to have no obvious interest in your product yet has an opinion about it and shows up from nowhere. Another group of stakeholders comprises people who, for no apparent reason, identify themselves as stakeholders, sometimes without your knowledge. These “surprise” stakeholders could present a risky, or at least uncomfortable, situation for you to handle. To avoid being surprised by an unforeseen group of stakeholders, think carefully about the many and various possible (special) stakeholders and stakeholder groups.

Keep a close eye on your surroundings. Regularly inspect your stakeholder field, look around and try to identify new stakeholders and stakeholder groups. Make sure to look for stakeholders both inside and outside your organization—those with a lot of interest, a little interest, direct and indirect interest, and even unlikely but possible interest.

Stakeholder Classification/Categorization

Identifying and categorizing stakeholders may be challenging at times. There are the obvious stakeholders, of course. But not all are that easily identified. In Chapter 29, “Tools for Stakeholder Classification and Grouping,” we explore different techniques for stakeholder identification and grouping, but an initial way of categorizing stakeholders is by considering these four groups: users, influencers, providers, and governance stakeholders.

• User: The people who buy and/or use your product to solve their problems, challenges, or fulfill their needs. These people either have a direct stake or an indirect stake in the product. Especially with B2C products, this group may be very large.

  Note that one individual may be a user, a buyer, or both, as discussed in Part II, “The Customer Representative.” Users and buyers often have different needs and desires.

• Provider: The people who help you to create the product or service or who help you to get it in the hands of the user. Without providers, the product does not exist, but there might be more than one way to deliver the product. Providers may be external suppliers, vendors, or partners, and they may include internal teams, other departments, and your Scrum Team of course (although that last one is not a stakeholder, right?).

• Governance: We talked about governance in Part VI, “The Collaborator.” Governance stakeholders usually do not help you to deliver value directly, but they can block you from delivering value or may delay the process of delivering value. These stakeholders often have an indirect interest in the product because they won’t be creating it or using it. They typically want to ensure that the product is compliant to standards, such as legal, security, or architecture requirements.

• Influencers: Not to be confused with the Influencer stance of the Product Owner, influencer stakeholders are the people who want to influence the product or service. Their influence doesn’t directly contribute to the creation, development, delivery, or distribution of the product. Influencers might include people like the board of directors and management, accountants, the government, politicians, and competitors.

Identifying stakeholders is not too challenging for most Product Owners. The important ones that they collaborate with frequently are rather easy to list. However, we often find Product Owners who forget about relevant stakeholders who are not part of the daily business. Table 28.1 lists 31 types of stakeholders for your inspiration. It highlights the different types of stakeholders, including what kinds of benefits they might provide for your organization.

Information and Insights to Gather on Stakeholders

If you want to engage with and manage stakeholders effectively, it’s important to know who they are. For example, it is helpful to know more about your stakeholders than just their names, departments, and jobs. Get to know the person behind the stakeholder: their interests, motivations, goals, and personality. Before creating your stakeholder management strategy, spend some time discovering what drives them. There are many factors to consider and/or research, but here are some questions that might be worthwhile exploring:

• What goals are important to the stakeholder? What are their personal goals? What are their business objectives? How do those objectives align with your product vision, strategy, and goals?

• What motivates the stakeholder to get out of bed in the morning? What do they seek to contribute to the company, its people, and your product or service?

• What does the stakeholder fear most? Asking them about their fears is often a great way to discover their motivators.

• What interest does your stakeholder have in your product, service, work, or team? Are they supportive or against your initiative? What are their needs?

• What kind of influence do they have? Is their influence high or low? What level of organizational power do they have?

• What type of person is this stakeholder? What’s their personality? What is their preferred style of communication?

• Who are some important influencers to this stakeholder? To whom does the person listen? What are the interests and goals of the stakeholders behind this stakeholder? How do those people, goals, and interests influence the stakeholder?

Personal goals, business goals, and needs are strong motivators that can define your stakeholders’ behaviors. Their personal goals and objectives may or may not align with their business objectives, and they may or may not be open and transparent about them. However, spending some time on building a relationship and learning about their goals will likely prove to be valuable time spent. It is also important to know who has the respect and “ear” of an important stakeholder—this person may be able to engage with the stakeholder on your behalf. Not having to influence and engage with all the stakeholders directly can be a great time-saver, but nevertheless, you should be prepared to do so.

The Influence of the Stakeholder

Once you have identified your stakeholders and perhaps learned more about their goals, objectives, and character, you will want to get a clear idea of how to engage with them. Start by identifying the amount of power or influence and the interest each of the stakeholders may have.

Stakeholders will have many different wishes, requirements, and issues that can vary considerably and that frequently conflict with each other. A valuable wish from one stakeholder may not provide any value for another stakeholder. Having a good understanding of your different types of stakeholders and how to engage with them is therefore key to effective stakeholder management. The balance between the power and interest of a stakeholder determines whether you need to actively collaborate with them or can take a more distant or indirect approach.

You can divide influence into formal influence and informal influence. There are stakeholders, based on their formal, hierarchical position, who have and can use their influence. Think of stakeholders as being at a management or board of directors’ level. In many organizations, Product Owners must listen to and deal with stakeholders who can use this form of influence. In addition to the formal leaders, some people can influence informal leadership. They have gained a certain status or reputation among colleagues that gives them clout in the organization. This is an informal influence. You probably know someone who does not have a management position yet gets a lot of things done in the organization. You also want to have a clear picture of these informal influence stakeholders. Examples include human resources departments and executives’ administrative assistants. They don’t have a lot of formal power over you, but they do influence management’s agenda to a great extent.