How do you approach stakeholder management differently based on the team you're talking to?

Never underestimate the importance of understanding different perspectives. For any given topic, Leadership, the Board, Sales, Customer Success, Marketing, Professional Services, Product Marketing, and/or Finance bring unique views, based on their experience, biases, and needs (i.e. “what’s in it for them?”). Depending on the topic and the audience, catering messaging, format, and the level of detail is key to getting a point across, communicating an update, reaching a decision, or asking for an ...Read More

My stakeholder management approach is fundamentally about strategic translation - helping each team see operations as their strategic partner, not just a support function. Sales Ops is about acceleration: How can we remove barriers to closing deals faster? Marketing Ops focuses on agility: Creating frameworks that make campaign execution seamless Engineering Ops emphasizes predictability: Providing stable, scalable infrastructure that enables innovation Finance Ops centers on optimization: Demon ...Read More

It’s important to understand the goals and challenges of the teams you’re working with. I’ve found that by considering their priorities and their communication styles you can improve your partnership tremendously. I am going to give some examples, however this is not meant to overgeneralize because teams differ at different companies. Here is how it works for me now: Go to Marketing Leadership (Sales, Marketing, CS): It’s important to communicate how your work aids in achieving these team’s goal ...Read More

I tailor stakeholder management by mapping who they are, what they care about, and how they want to engage—then I match the message, artifact, and cadence to that profile. These are steps I have used repeatedly for developing stakeholder relationships and managing them: Map stakeholders: note influence/interest, goals, risks, preferred channel/cadence, time zone, and bandwidth—this sets how often you update them, what you share, and the level of detail. Tailor the message: execs (outcomes/ROI/ri ...Read More

I do not base my approach so much on the team I'm talking to, rather it's more about individual personalities, their stylistic preferences and how they fit with mine. Things like how often we meet, how well we know each other, what the nature of the work is all matter. With some people, we're serious about work but have fun. For example, our SVP of Sales told me I should have a reality tv show and that he'd even invest in it. That's not a conversation I would have with someone in the product org ...Read More