Business success – it goes both ways
Strong connections build successful businesses. Whether this relates to the partnerships within your company, between your organisation and another, or with your market, establishing reciprocal relationships should be one of your business’s key targets.
Your stakeholder groups provide a good gauge of your company performance, as you are accountable to each to fulfil your end of the deal. For employees this might constitute scope for promotion, for clients this might be offering technical support with a product. If one of your stakeholder groups is dissatisfied this instantly signals that your organisation is getting something wrong. There are few indicators that change is required as definite as this.
A limiting mindset – Short-term focus
For adolescent stage businesses, transactional relationships can often be established that offer a quick fix, or short-term win. This is understandable as leaders are pressed for time and will feel compelled to make speedy decisions just to keep their company competitive. Whilst I have experience of, and can sympathise with, this approach, this should not be your ongoing strategy for onboarding stakeholders.
Partnerships that are established quickly, and without due diligence, will more often than not turn out to be suboptimal. Your values may not align, you won’t have a chance to pre-agree suitable targets and neither party will have invested enough to understand what to expect from the other.
If I asked you whether every relationship your company had with its clients, employees and partners was a complete success, what would your response be?
A missing element – Your shopping list
To engage in the most productive stakeholder relationships you need to know what you want from them first. Assess your business’s key targets and what reaching them would specifically look like. This will give you a plan of action to work from, as well as demonstrating what input each stakeholder group will need to provide. For clients, how many sales will you need to make? For suppliers, what resources will you require to meet demand?
Once you have this clear picture in front of you, the next step is to consider your values. What is indicative of your organisation? What are the key competencies and behaviours you value most? From the goals you wish to attain and the methods you want to employ, you can create ideal stakeholder criteria for each group. This ‘shopping list’ will ensure you are onboarding the right people, because the most relevant questions are being asked early on.
This may not seem relevant to your clients, as many companies will feel any business is good business. This is not the case. Some customers will require too much investment and attention to make them a worthwhile stakeholder. Make sure you are appealing to right people.
Relationships are often best when each party knows what to expect from the other from the offset; then there can be no nasty surprises.
A different perspective – Ingredients for productive relationships
Good stakeholder relationships tend to be long-term, as finding new people requires an investment of time, money and energy. You will also find that as time goes on, the understanding you build will mean communication is easier and greater care is taken by each party to help the other reach their targets.
The best partnerships include each of following features:
Reciprocity – First and foremost it is vital that each partner is getting what they want. If this is not the case then the relationship is not working. Even if there is a slight imbalance, this can generate resentment and consequently, a reduction in engagement and care. Regularly, check in with your stakeholders to ensure they are satisfied (or hopefully delighted) by your input. Equally, if you don’t feel they are pulling their weight, tell them. With regard to clients, you could conduct customer surveys to discover their opinion.
Trust credits – These are earned as the relationship develops, where consistently delivering to the expected standard (or above) means you have good will in the bank. If your stakeholders know that you are reliable and can provide what they want, they are more likely to be sympathetic when unexpected challenge arise. For example, if you run a bus company that offers transport that consistently arrives on time, the occasional breakdown can be more easily forgiven.
Transparency – Linking to the point above, being transparent with your stakeholder builds good will. If people feel you are misleading them, this has an incredibly damaging effect. If you can’t meet a certain target, due to unforeseen external influences, then let your stakeholder know as soon as possible. In a world where people want a more personal connection, rather than dealing with a faceless company, honesty is the most valuable currency.
I encourage my clients to assess their various stakeholder relationships and see if each of these three ingredients is present. If you could be doing more to fulfil, or delight your stakeholders what needs to change? If they’re not meeting their side of the bargain, then how can you raise this with them? If you come to conclusion that the partnership is beyond adjustment, then consider an offboarding strategy.
Building a business is a team game. Make sure everyone knows what position they are playing and that you are all shooting into the same goal.