Stakeholder Management: Dubai Canal Project

The Dubai Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) had recently announced via the media and its own social media outlets the planned road diversion works for the Dubai Canal Project.

Stakeholders contribute tremendously to the success of construction projects. A project stakeholder is defined as a person, persons, and/or entities that have an interest in the project. In addition to everyone working directly on the project, stakeholders can also include individuals, people, and/or entities operating outside the project, and also outside the organization(s) but still involved with the project in one way or another. 

The Project Management Institute (PMI) identifies Stakeholder Management as a Knowledge Area, and defines it as the processes required to identifying all individuals and entities that could affect, or be affected by, the project. It also includes understanding the expectations of the stakeholders from this project, and the level of impact each stakeholder has; and ultimately, developing a plan of action to engage, manage and control the involvement and expectations of the stakeholders in order to ensure project success.

Power-Interest Grid

During stakeholder analysis, it is vital to evaluate the impact each stakeholder generates. One way of doing so is by using the above Power-Interest Grid. With critical factors already in place that challenge the project success, this step aids tremendously in identifying what needs to be done to rightly engage stakeholders with the project, and in due time if needs be, their commitment to supporting its success.

Both the Contractor on-site, and the RTA, realize that the public at-large utilizing Sheikh Zayed Road for their daily commutes will surely have a high interest in the progress of the Dubai Canal Project, yet the impact that the public has on the progress of this project is considered low. Therefore, and in addition for safety aspects, the 'Keep Informed' approach is implemented. 

As another example, for the Contractor, the RTA Liaison Engineer assigned has a high level of impact on this project, and also has a high level of interest in it. Therefore, the Contractor will need to implement the 'Manage Closely' approach to ensure the project success.