Challenges In Encouraging Stakeholders To Form

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Abstract

Stakeholders are individuals or social groups, or organizations which matter to a system or those who enjoy rights and interests within a system. As such, stakeholders can influence or be affected by the attainment of the organization’s purpose. The classification of stakeholders into either primary or secondary hinges on an evaluation of whether they immediately affected by, or can immediately impact on the system. Choosing the best mode of forming a coalition is a matter of appreciating the drivers, risks, and opportunities linked to an issue, plus the needs and aspirations of the entity and its stakeholders relative to that issue (a "win-win" situation). The building of a coalition between the stakeholders can be built communication, in-depth dialogue, basic consultation, and forming working partnerships. Each successive approach entails an elevated commitment on both sides with regard to time and money, risk and cooperation.

Introduction

Meiz is an ICT company that provides ICT solutions to entities engaged in healthcare provision and relates to electronic health and care solutions. The services offered include telehealth, telemonitoring, telemedicine, and social alarms. Telecare encompasses the delivery of social care by means of telecommunications and computerized systems. This encompasses equipments that avail incessant, automatic, and remote screening of care needs and emergencies. The company also avails required IT –infrastructure needed in hospitals and care homes such as data security (data protection) solutions and those that facilitate accessibility to personal health data.

Stakeholder Identification

Internal stakeholders represent those groupings of individuals who entirely function within the boundaries of the organization such as administrators and employees. External stakeholders, on the other hand, entail those groupings that fall into three categories relative to their relationship to the organization: individuals who avail inputs to the organization; entities that compete with the organization for aspects such as clients and resources; and, those groupings that manifest significant interest in the manner in which the organization functions.

Primary stakeholders entail those whose perpetual association is totally necessary for the firm’s survival such as employees, clients, investors, and shareholders, as well as governments and communities engaged in availing critical infrastructure. Primary stakeholders entail both public and private users of ICT solutions and include senior and impaired services, as well as private caregivers’ mainly family members or relatives.

Secondary stakeholders do not characteristically engage in transactions within an entity; therefore, are not critical for its survival such as the media, and trade associations. The secondary stakeholders entail professional users of the ICT solutions including medical professionals and professional care givers working within care homes.

The tertiary stakeholders encompass suppliers of ICT ageing solutions, research organizations and finally enterprises. Enterprise entails business operating in tele-medicine or tele-care and those that provide IT infrastructure such as networks and databases. Quaternary stakeholders include proponents of ICT for healthcare solutions, policy makers, especially within the health sector (and private insurance companies) public administrators, media, and civil society organizations.

The roles of primary and secondary stakeholder groups

Stakeholder group and benefits

The issues pertinent to employees encompass compensation and benefits, employee diversity, occupational health and safety, training and development, and communication with management. Customers, on the other hand, pursue aspects such as product safety and quality, service to disabled clients, and management of customer complaints.

The issues pertinent to investors entail transparency of shareholder communications and shareholder rights, while the issues pertinent to the community include public health and safety protection, conservation of energy and materials, and donations in support of community projects. Environmental groups, on the other hand, concerned with the reduction of the utilization of energy, cutting emissions and waste, and cutting adverse environmental impacts of goods and services.

Ways in which the stakeholders can influence the destiny of your business

There is no doubt that stakeholders possess immense influence on the achievement of the entity’s objectives. As such, stakeholders have a significant impact on the destiny of the company, which makes imperative that the management of Meiz selects alternatives that overall optimize net stakeholder benefits.

It is no doubt that a coalition create value for corporations as it aids entities to move from a reactive stance (problem-avoidance), to proactive (information-seeking) and eventually to progressive (solutions-oriented). The building of a coalition is critical as it awards entities "a license to operate." Entities are able to highlight emerging issues and spotlight solutions to shared challenges.

The building of a coalition aids entities to move from risk management to strategic positioning. Stakeholder engagement can aid an entity to meet tactical and strategic needs ranging from the collection of information, and highlighting trends that may influence the organization’s activities. Other benefits that can be derived from a coalition of stakeholders include enhancing transparency, and building trust between individuals or groups whose support is essential to the entity’s long-term survival. The coalition may also sparkle the innovation and organization changes needed to satisfy fresh challenges and opportunities.

A plan to encourage stakeholders to form a coalition

A coalition refers to an alliance of diverse stakeholders that coalesce to address a certain problem or issue and attain shared objectives. When the interests are analogous, stakeholders may construct coalitions, temporary alliances in order to pursue common objectives. Stakeholders’ coalitions are not necessary rigid an in most instances shift across departments. A plan for stakeholder coalition entails steps such as laying down a plan (highlighting basic objectives, concerns to be addressed, and the stakeholders that need prioritization); internal awareness and alignment with stakeholders; building trust; and, consultation. Stakeholder engagement describes a full range of an organization’s efforts pursuing an understanding and involving stakeholders in the entity’s activities and decisions.

An effective plan of building a coalition between stakeholders entail: communication via one-way channels designed to spread information; consultation and dialogue through interactive channels; building partnerships that create value and centered on finding a solution. Communication with stakeholders encompasses something that most organizations do. Most organizations convey information regarding themselves their products, plans, and viewpoints to entities that want to know and to those whom it pursues to influence.

Consultation entails the process of gathering information or suggestion from stakeholders and the feedback into consideration to revise plans arrive at decisions or set directions. Consultation can create value via enhance performance by allowing companies to enhance their decision-making and performance by requesting external perceptions on current and emerging issues such as changing expectations on corporate responsibility that might influence on the company; perceptions of the entity that act as a catalyst for effecting change within the corporate practices and policies; and, impact on a company’s performance, products, communications, and services.

Just like consultation, dialogue incorporates an exchange of views and opinion; however, dialogue pursues diverse perspectives, needs and substitutes with an outlook to cultivating mutual understanding, trust, and cooperation on a concern, initiative, or strategy. Partnerships, within the milieu of corporate social responsibility interactions details an arrangement of public, business, and civil constituencies who delve into common societal endeavors via linking their resources and competencies and sharing both risks and benefits.

Challenges in encouraging stakeholders to form a coalition

Coalitions result from purposeful, concerted, and meticulous efforts among individuals who comprehend that collective action is strong compared to action undertaken by loosely affiliated entities. Coalitions remain created and reinforced via diverse stages such as issue identification and specification, creation of core membership, stakeholder mapping, demonstrating credibility, resolute expansion, and sustainable transformation. Building constructive and reciprocally beneficial relationships across corporation boundaries are a growing part of management’s function. One of challenges in encouraging stakeholders to construct a coalition flows from the fact that the external environment within the business is dynamic and ever changing. Similarly, the contemporary business environment confronted by shifting societal expectations as organization expects the corporation to be more responsible. Coalition building demands to undertake an intricate range of challenges inclusive of getting the communication dimension right.

Conclusion

The firm should adopt initiatives that guarantee that it abides by or surpass stakeholder expectations and bear a positive impact on stakeholder issues. The evaluation of stakeholders’ expectations takes the form of "triple bottom line" encompassing aspects such as economic, environmental, and social concerns. Stakeholders mainly avail tangible or intangible resources critical to the survival of an entity. Stakeholder engagement can be effective as it requires to be grounded in honest, transparent, accurate, and timely information, as the contemporary stakeholders, are ready to identify superficial communications efforts or critical gaps in performance information.