Advising Upwards

Much has been written about leadership and team building, but there are still major gaps in thinking and research about how to engage senior stakeholders in support of an organisation's projects. The central role of stakeholders in the successful delivery of organisational strategy is becoming increasingly recognised, as is the importance of developing a sponsor culture to support more collaborative practices within the organisation. Building, and managing, relationships with senior (upwards) stakeholders is essential for success. Advising Upwards brings together the ideas of experts in fields related to engaging senior stakeholders, such as risk management, decision-making, understanding cultural considerations, effective communication and other disciplines that may enhance the sustainable engagement of senior stakeholders. The starting point is an examination of the difficulties that senior managers face as they move through the ranks of an organisation from middle management to executive levels. Senior managers usually move up through the organisation on the basis of command and control management. Once in the executive ranks they must develop a more collaborative approach and adopt the principles of emotional intelligence (EQ) to succeed. Awareness of difficulties that senior stakeholders may face drives effective approaches for communication between the team and sponsors. Case studies and stories from experts illustrate practical, structured approaches that enable the teams to develop robust relationships with senior stakeholders will result in teams 'being heard', and support their 'being extraordinary' through innovative approaches to advising upwards.

Dr Lynda Bourne PMP, FAIM, is an international authority on stakeholder engagement using the Stakeholder CircleAR: www.stakeholder-management.com. She works with organisations globally to manage change through managing the relationships essential for successful delivery of organisational outcomes. She has presented these ideas at conferences and seminars in Europe, Russia, Asia, North and South America, and Australia to audiences from the IT, construction, defence and mining industries. Her book: Stakeholder Relationship Management was published in 2009. She has contributed to books on stakeholder engagement, and has published papers in many academic and professional journals, including a chapter in 2010 on stakeholder engagement in Project Management Offices (PMO) faor the Project Management Institute's (PMI) publication - PMOSIG Program Management Office Handbook. She was 2010 President of the PMI's Melbourne Chapter and has contributed a quarterly column for PMI's PM Network since 2008.