The Stakeholder Analysis Method

Stakeholder analysis (also called stakeholder mapping) is a method of determining the levels of interest and influence an individual, group, or organization have in an information system development as defined in Bourne, (2010). Stakeholder analysis is a method that prompt project team members understand different stakeholders interests in a project and increase the chances of producing a successful product. It helps in deciding which stakeholders might have the most influence over the success or failure of project, the most influential supporters or principled opponents. De Baar (2006) elaborated it more as a technique to identify and analyze the information on stakeholders surrounding a project, their relationships, interests, and expectations

The guide went further to advice project team to identify stakeholders to determine their requirements, and then manage these requirements to ensure a successful outcome. Although, there are many existing techniques (Bryson 2004, Mitchel, Agle and Wood 1997), which are mostly related to strategic management not specifically on IS projects. De Baar (2006) suggested three steps for Stakeholder analysis as: identification, expectations and interests, influence and role. Some of the mentioned characteristics of stakeholder analysis are missing therefore; these steps may not provide the information needed for the management to strategize. Schmeer (Schmeer)in his Stakeholder Analysis guidelines gave eight steps which include planning the process, selecting and defining the project, identifying the key stakeholders, adopting the tools collecting and recording the information, completing the stakeholder table, analyzing the stakeholder table and using the information. He advised that application of these steps will help management and project managers to be well-informed about the politics surrounding their

Sharp et al 1999 concludes that management and information system literatures have noted this deficiency. The criticism is based on the assumption that stakeholder categorization is too generic to be of practical use. Okwumabua (2013) presents a comprehensive list of project stakeholders in information system without indicating how a particular stakeholder is identified. Scott, (2012) in his Agile Modeling (AM) considers a number of key stakeholders without explaining how they were identified. Pouloudi and Whitley (1997) use four principles to identify stakeholders in the drug use management system. Most institutions develop techniques for internal consumption, for example, Stakeholder Identification and Analysis (SIA) technique developed at University of Sunderland, (Davison et al, 2003). Knoke and Kuklinski (1982) proposed network approach, a theoretical tool for social network focusing on the wide network of relationships among organizations, (Pouloudi and Whitley, 1997). It consists of three components: actors, resources, and activities. Some researchers proposed adopting snowballing technique during stakeholder identification (INVOLVE, 2005; Ananda and Herath, 2003; Hair et al., 2000; Araujo and Bramwell, 1999). Hair et al., (2000) notice that snowballing technique may be bias if