Join the Movement: Let's Rebrand "Stakeholders" to "Internal Partners”

WHERE TO: Collaborative product development that yields results

WHERE FROM: We come from a place of us vs them. The Product team vs the Sales team, the Product team vs leadership, the Product team vs the stakeholders. The lack of alignment, collaboration, and empathy is staggering. Especially considering that everyone IS a stakeholder. Everyone involved owns part of the success and failure, and everyone wants to be consulted. So the term “Stakeholder” doesn’t hit the mark and certainly doesn’t create a vision of a cohesive team working together towards a goal.

WHERE NEXT: It’s time for a new approach. Let’s start a movement of rebranding “stakeholders” to “internal partners”. It might not seem like a big change but the impact can be huge! Let me explain...

The Problem with "Stakeholders"

Words are powerful.

The names we use have an impact.

Language shapes our interactions.

The word “stakeholder” is everywhere these days. But its origin dates back to the 1700s, in the gambling world, as a way of describing someone who took bets, someone who had a direct interest in a gamble. Over time, it evolved to refer to anyone with an interest in the success of an initiative. That’s how we ended up calling “stakeholder” to the people involved in the decision-making and activities of a business, organization, or project.

However, the very definition of a stakeholder holds a misconception. That misconception is the first on a list of reasons why we should discard this term.

1. Everyone Has a Stake

A “stakeholder” is someone with an interest in a business, organization, or project. But isn’t everyone involved a stakeholder? When a Product team is working on its product, don’t the team members have an interest in the work they’re doing? Don’t every sales person, CS rep, implementation manager, account owner, etc. also have a stake in the outcome the product team is bound to achieve???

Calling other people “stakeholders” makes it seem that THEY are somehow less invested in the bet. THEY aren’t involved in the doing. THEY are simply going to reap part of the benefit if the initiative is successful. THEY have alternative ways to generate success and aren’t reliant on the product team.

But in fact everything is a WE. All of our successes are intertwined. Product cannot get into customers’ hands without the GTM team and Sales has nothing to sell without Product. Product cannot respond to every user error issue that CS so gracefully resolves and Customer Service Reps can’t fix actual bugs without Product. The trend goes on and on across every team in your organization. EVERYONE needs EVERYONE else. EVERYONE has an interest in Product successfully developing features that customers value.

2. Dehumanizing Effect

Referring to people as "stakeholders" has a dehumanizing effect. It makes it easy to forget that they are individuals with their own needs, goals, and responsibilities. They are people who have to pay rent, put food on their table, and like to go on vacation. The term fosters the us vs them mentality and removes the product team’s responsibility to build empathy for them.

Calling them stakeholders reduces them to corporate function, rather than recognizing them as human beings with unique perspectives and valuable contributions. Beyond that, chances are they are people who interact with your customers or prospective customers directly. When you think of them from this perspective, instead of worrying about “managing” them or their expectations, you might instead think of what you can gain from these people.

3. Overplayed Term

The word "stakeholders" has become so widely used that it often loses its meaning. It became a catch-all phrase for anyone not on the nuclear product team. It fails to capture the nuances and complexities of the relationships and responsibilities involved in product development and the people who play a role in it. If EVERYONE is a stakeholder, then you are going to be using that term A LOT.

 

The Alternative: “INTERNAL PARTNERS”

The idea of rebranding stakeholders came to me on a fireside chat with Christian Idiodi for my Mastering Product Roadmaps course for PLA. He brought up a lot of the points above (mainly #1) and said “We have to stop using the word stakeholder.” My proposal to him, and to YOU, is that we start calling them “internal partners”. A partner is on the “us” side of things, they are literally part of the success rather than being on the outside.

Changing this word changes our mindset about the PEOPLE we are talking about. It is the first of many steps we all should take to improve collaboration in digital product development. A word change is not a silver bullet, but it can still be incredibly powerful. Let’s explore what could happen with a shift of terminology and related mindset.

Understanding the Needs and Goals of Internal Partners

When you see stakeholders as Internal Partners, you can start working with them the way you would an external partner. Partnerships always involve a give-and-take approach, not a one-way relationship. Understanding that is crucial for a healthy collaboration. For example, CS is an internal partner that requires updates on what’s changing in the product so they know how to support customers, but they also provide you with insights from your customers which can help you in discovery. It’s a similar story with Sales teams who will always have more exposure to prospects and NON-customers than Product does.

We tend to push that better products come from better discovery - thus the need for great relationships with CS and account management, but we also need to emphasize that better launches come from better relationships with our GTM internal partners. When sales, marketing, and product work together to understand the value of new features to customers, the messaging is clearer and the adoption tends to be improved.

As a product leader, it’s up to you to discover what a partner can offer you and what value you must provide them in return. While this is specific for each partner, there are a few basic guidelines that can help you navigate this:

1. Understand THEIR Incentives and Goals: Each internal partner has their own set of goals, priorities, and incentives driving their actions and decisions. Build empathy for these individuals’ motivations, and you can better align your product strategies. This understanding creates a collaborative environment that considers and addresses everyone's needs, including those of your internal partners.

2. Communication and Updates: Desire to be informed - this is a common, fundamental need all internal partners have. You can address this by providing regular and transparent communication. Ongoing communications keeps them informed, engaged, and aligned with the product's progress and direction. This avoids Product being referred to as a “Black Box” and instead to be thought of as transparent and communicative. Stay tuned for a post coming soon, detailing how you can keep your internal partners informed while making YOU look good at the same time.

3. Responsibility and Accountability: Though you gather inputs and feedback from internal partners, they are not responsible or accountable for product decisions - YOU are. Think about the RACI matrix, which divides everyone into four groups according to their level of involvement: Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, and Informed. Internal Partners should always be informed, and often consulted about product updates. They are responsible or accountable for their areas that ensure the company's success and Product is responsible and accountable for delivering the software which they sell or service. I’m not the biggest fan of formal RACI matrices, but the framework can be helpful in better understanding the role each partner plays in designing, developing, and launching product improvements. For implementation tips, see next week’s post.

 

Benefits of the New Terminology

As we’ve seen, words have power and impact. When you make the change to “Internal Partners” in your daily speech, more will change in your organization than just how you refer to stakeholders. The new terminology should also bring additional benefits:

1. Better Collaboration- The "internal partners" terminology fosters a mindset of collaboration and shared responsibility. This leads to improved idea-gathering processes, a better understanding of customer needs, and more coordinated go-to-market efforts. DOWN WITH THE SILOS!!!

2. Improved Accountability- Internal partners are more likely to feel accountable for their contributions and the joint success of the product if they see a clear delineation of responsibilities and a shared sense of ownership.

3. More Product Engagement- Theoretically, if the selected ideas that move forward into development and production are ones which more people across your company see value in, hopefully your customers will too. Beyond inherent value in what you create, a stronger GTM movement should increase new feature adoption as well.

4. Stronger Relationships- Building strong relationships with internal partners is crucial, not just for the success of the product but also for your own. Career advancement is made through smart work and the right connections. Having a strong relationship with internal partners, turns them into your advocates when you’re eyeing a promotion. Plus, if you ever think about establishing your own Personal Board of Directors (and you should! I explain why in this article), these people are excellent candidates to be part of your board.

Conclusion

Words have the power to shape our thoughts and influence our actions. Rebranding "stakeholders" as "internal partners" is not just a terminology shift. It’s a change in our mindset towards a more collaborative approach to product development.

Stay tuned for another article coming soon about practical tips on how to spread the word about this change in your organization!

In the meantime, if you’re already applying this terminology at your workplace, I’d love to hear from you! You can also send me an email at [email protected] to share your story or a question.

If you’d like to start driving this change but are still unsure how I invite you to check my programs to find the right fit for you or schedule a FREE 30-minute chat to talk about your current situation. Otherwise, you can also join a Personal Board of Directors program, such as Sidebar’s.