Stakeholder

The Concept of Stakeholder Management

Today, all players in business face the interest and the impact of different people and groupings.

Especially larger corporations have to care not only for the needs of their direct owners, but also of

various other groups, like employees, public interest groups like environmental organizations, strategic

partners, journalists or public monitoring bodies. According to each companies individual situation, this

list could easily be extended.

Therefore, all businesses operate within a complex system of interests and influences. Management

has to assess and evaluate these external forces in order to adjust them with corporate objectives.

These individuals and groups who depend on the organization to fulfill their own goals and on whom,

in turn, the organization depends, are called stakeholders.

When it comes to important corporate decisions, it is necessary to know about the expectations of

different stakeholders and to determine, to what extend they could and would exert an influence.

Hence, the importance of stakeholder management is not limited on day-to-day business. On the

contrary, it is primarily concerned with long-term strategic decisions. These are all those developments

that affect at least particular stakeholders.

Identification of Stakeholders

When identifying stakeholders it is not enough to focus on the formal structure of the organization.

Rather it is necessary to have a look at informal and indirect relationships too. A useful model for this

purpose is to visualize the stakeholder environment as a set of inner and outer circles. The inner

circles stand for the most important stakeholders who have the highest influence.

1

...