People are great at jumping to conclusions, and when left to their own devices, they usually jump straight to bad ones. That’s why it’s important to give your stakeholders updates before the ask!
😱 What happens when you’re quiet
As someone who used to have to update stakeholders and is now often the dramatic stakeholder, the problem with silence is that you assume the worst. That could be:
nothing’s happened, or we’re moving more slowly than we should be
something’s gone wrong and people don’t want to tell me
something’s gone wrong and I need to intervene
the team’s gone off-track and I need to course-correct
That usually means that your stakeholder chases you up because they’re nervous, or sometimes they’re even on the hook to report back to OTHER stakeholders.
Even worse, if you ever ask people for an update and they actually have an update for you, it means you don’t trust them to ever tell you if something’s wrong, so you learn that you need to chase. Not fun for anyone.
💬 What happens when you update proactively
Stakeholders LOVE a proactive update, even if it’s just to say there is no update. It builds trust, positions you as a reliable collaborator, and helps them to just be less stressed.
Being a proactive update-giver is not on any career ladder or talked about as a skill you need to develop, but it is something that is really instrumental to gaining respect across an organisation. People who are great at proactively soothing their stakeholders with regular updates that give the right amount of detail are remembered as people they like to work with. My favourite people to work with from other departments are often not the “best” at the skills, but they’re just so reliable and easy to collaborate with. And people who demonstrate these skills regularly are the ones that get put on bigger, cooler projects – because leadership trusts them.
Your stakeholders when you forget to tell them what you’re doing
It can take a while to get used to writing regular updates, especially if you’re in a role where you’ve usually had someone else to rely on to do it. But it’ll eventually become a habit, and you’ll feel compelled to talk to your stakeholders before they ask before you know it!
Until then, you can just fake it a bit. Put reminders in your calendar to update people – nobody has to know! 🤫
