What Is a Stakeholder? | Meaning and Examples
The word stakeholder comes up a lot in the context of job applications and interviews. Here, a “stakeholder” basically means any person or group who can affect or be affected by what a business does.
Depending on the context, stakeholders could include:
- Customers
- Shareholders and investors
- Employees
- Suppliers
- Local communities
- Labor unions
- Media organizations
- Industry trade groups
When you see the word stakeholder in job descriptions, it often means the people whose support, cooperation, or approval is important to get the work being described done. So if you read something like “collaborate with internal stakeholders,” it probably just means that the job involves working closely with people in teams from other departments.
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Key takeaways
- A stakeholder is any individual, group, or organization that can affect or be affected by the activities of a business or a particular project.
- Internal stakeholders include employees, managers, and departments within a business, while external stakeholders include customers, suppliers, investors, regulators, and local communities.
- Primary stakeholders are essential to a business’s continued operation, while secondary stakeholders can influence or be affected by the business but aren’t generally essential to its continued operation.
- In job descriptions, working with stakeholders usually means collaborating with people or teams whose input, cooperation, or approval is important to getting the work done.
- In project management, understanding stakeholders’ different interests and priorities is important for deciding how to involve them in a project, gathering their input, and keeping them informed.
What does stakeholder mean?
In business management, a stakeholder can be an individual person, a group of people, or an organization or other body that affects or is affected by what a business does.
A company’s employees are an important stakeholder group, for example, because their jobs depend on the business, and the business depends on their work. And so are customers, because they’re affected by changes in the quality, price, or availability of the business’s products or services, and the business is affected if they stop buying them.
Internal and external stakeholders
Job descriptions often distinguish between internal and external stakeholders.
Employees, managers, executives, and even whole departments or divisions can be referred to as internal stakeholders. So, if you work in a company’s IT department, your internal stakeholders probably include employees who use your IT systems, managers in other departments who ask you for new software or hardware, and senior executives who have the final say over your department’s budget.
Customers, suppliers, outside investors, regulators, and local communities, on the other hand, are external stakeholders. If a job posting for a procurement role mentions external stakeholders, for example, it probably means suppliers and contractors.
Primary and secondary stakeholders
You might also see stakeholders categorized according to how important their continued involvement is to a business.
Primary stakeholders—like employees, customers, shareholders, investors, and key suppliers—are essential to the business’s continued operation and success. In contrast, secondary stakeholders can influence or be affected by the business but aren’t generally essential to its continued operation. Examples could include specific media organizations, campaign groups, or industry associations.
What is a stakeholder in project management?
In project management, stakeholder essentially means the same thing as it does in business management. The difference is that you’re talking about people or groups who can affect or be affected by a particular project, rather than the activities of a business or organization as a whole.
For example, imagine a local government authority is planning to build a new road. The project’s stakeholders would include groups like local residents, nearby businesses, construction contractors, environmental groups, and the authority funding the work.
Each group will have different interests and priorities. Local businesses could be worried about disruption during construction, while residents might be concerned about how the new road will affect traffic congestion and noise levels. Some stakeholders may even oppose the project altogether.
Or imagine a company that wants to introduce a new customer relationship management (CRM) system. The project stakeholders here would include the IT team responsible for implementing it, the sales and customer service employees who will use it, department managers who need reports from it, and senior executives who approve the budget.
These stakeholders will have different priorities and bring different types of knowledge and expertise to the project. The IT team might be focused on security and getting the system up and running smoothly, while employees who’ll use it might be more concerned about how well it fits into their existing workflows.
An important part of project management is therefore understanding the needs and concerns of different stakeholders, gathering their input, deciding how best to involve them in the project, and keeping them informed about its progress.
Stakeholder examples
The following table demonstrates how employers might use the word stakeholder in job descriptions and interviews.
| Context | Example sentence | Who the stakeholders might be |
|---|---|---|
| Data analyst job description | “Present data analysis and insights to key stakeholders to support business decisions.” | Department managers, senior executives, finance teams, and colleagues who use the data to make decisions |
| Software developer job description | “Work closely with stakeholders to gather requirements for new software features.” | Product managers, clients, end users, and colleagues in other departments |
| Marketing manager job description | “Coordinate with internal and external stakeholders to deliver successful marketing campaigns.” | Sales teams, product managers, senior executives, advertising agencies, and external creative teams |
| Interview for an HR manager role | “Tell me about a time you had to manage conflicting stakeholder expectations.” | Employees, department managers, senior executives, and employee representatives |
| Interview for a project manager role | “How do you keep stakeholders informed about project progress?” | Project sponsors, clients, project team members, senior managers, and external contractors |
| Procurement specialist job description | “Build and maintain strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders.” | Suppliers, contractors, finance teams, department managers, and employees who purchase goods or services |
| Public-sector project officer job description | “Engage with stakeholders to gather feedback on proposed changes to local services.” | Local residents, service users, community organizations, elected representatives, and government departments |
| Interview for customer success manager role | “How would you handle a situation where different stakeholders at a client company have competing priorities?” | The client company’s senior executives, department managers, IT teams, and employees who use the product or service |
Frequently asked questions about the meaning of stakeholder
- What is a key stakeholder?
-
In the context of job applications and job descriptions, a key stakeholder is a stakeholder who is especially important to a particular business activity, decision, or project. In other words, it is likely to be a person or department inside or outside the business that you’ll need to work closely with to carry out the responsibilities of the role.
For example, the key stakeholders involved in launching a new product might include the product development team, marketing department, sales managers, and a major customer.
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