Creating a shared view of stakeholder engagement
Challenge
A Victorian government organisation had brought several areas together through a restructure. Each had established stakeholders, relationships and ways of working. With significant legislative reform approaching, the organisation needed a clearer, shared view of its stakeholder landscape.
Engagement was happening across the organisation, but information about relationships and activity sat across different teams and with individual staff. This made it harder to see who was being engaged, by whom and when, and to coordinate activity across the organisation. This was leading to duplicated engagement and missed opportunities to coordinate across the organisation, creating a risk of mixed messages, stakeholder fatigue and damage to important relationships.
What We Did
Vant brought existing knowledge and materials together to build a whole-of-organisation stakeholder register and practical engagement guidance framework.
We mapped relationships across multiple functions, documented who owned each relationship and made overlaps and gaps easier to see. Alongside the register, we developed practical tools and guidance to help teams plan and coordinate engagement, supported by shared principles and a common language.
We led the mapping and consolidation, then validated the detail with executives through short, focused sessions.
Outcome
The organisation gained a shared picture of its stakeholder relationships that executives and teams could use. Teams could see where stakeholders were being engaged across different areas, making it easier to coordinate activity and take a more consistent approach ahead of the reform program.
The register provided a stronger base for planning and reporting, helping teams identify overlaps, gaps and opportunities to work together. The guidance gave staff a clear starting point for engagement planning while leaving room for judgement based on the stakeholder, circumstances and level of risk.
The aim was not to increase the volume of engagement, but to make it more coordinated and purposeful. The register and guidance were built around the organisation’s existing knowledge and designed to support everyday work.