Stakeholder Engagement - Cranfield School of Management ...

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Understanding Stakeholders and their Wants and Needs
Identifying SWANS and OWANS can help shape your
organisational processes – strategies, processes, and capabilities –
Figure 8: SWANS and OWANS: The Performance Prism
The Performance Prism
SWANs What do our various stakeholders
want and need?
Strategies What strategies are we pursuing to
satisfy these wants and needs?
Processes What processes do we need to put
in place to enable us to achieve
these strategies?
Capabilities What capabilities do we require if
we are to operate these processes?
OWANs What do we want and need from
our stakeholders to enable all of
this to happen?
Source: Prof. Andy Neely, Cranfield University, School of Management, UK.
After making an initial assessment of which of your stakeholders
may represent a priority for your organisation, you should make
strenuous efforts to ‘get under the skin’ of those priority
stakeholders to understand their thinking and decision making
processes: what motivates them; what objectives they seek; what
are their expectations of the company; and, why and how their
vision and interpretation of issues are influenced by their history,
culture, ways of working and relations with others.
Understanding and appreciating these elements, and others, will
make your likelihood of successfully engaging with them at a later
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to deliver these SWANS and OWANS, as described further in
Figure 8.
Stakeholder
Satisfaction
Strategies
stage much greater. In the Appendix (5.2) we have provided
some tips on how to better understand NGOs and their
motivations ahead of engagement.
At this stage, potentially sensitive information may need to be
collected through third parties as it is important not to raise
expectations unnecessarily before a final decision on whether to
engage or not has been taken.The careful management of
expectations is crucial to the future chances of successfully
engaging, as the nature of expectations themselves can
significantly influence future outcomes.
Example: Understanding NGO Personalities and Characteristics
A global organisation in the extractive industry recognised that their reputation was being negatively impacted by the
international image of their operations in emerging markets in Africa. Nigeria was highlighted as a key area where interaction
with stakeholders was required, particularly with regard to human rights issues.
The organisation soon recognised the need to understand the specific and localised dynamics of the human rights civil
society organisations, including academics and faith based organisations in the country and searched for a critically positioned
individual or organisation who could provide them with insight into the localised situation of roles, relationships and
expectations of the various human rights organisations.
The selected organisation mapped out the NGOs, their areas of interest, the key personalities, key contacts, critical issues
and concerns. Furthermore they identified a personality known as Mr.A, who was previously the president of the Nigerian
Bar Association and inaugural president of the Civil Liberty Organization of Nigeria to assist them to better understand the
‘landscape’. Mr.A. had played a leading role in protesting for civil liberties in Nigeria when the military refused to relinquish
power, and as a result had been the centre of mobilising social and labour movements to protest and campaign for the return
of Nigeria to democracy.The Civil Liberty Organization of Nigeria that he helped found in partnership with other groups
played a fundamental role in ensuring the restoration of democracy in the country.And at the end of that process Mr.A
continued to work in a common framework with a wide range of civil society organisations making him very suitably placed
to comment and provide information on their interests, concerns and expectations.
This provided the organisation with critical information in the preparation of their stakeholder engagement strategy in Nigeria.