Tools for action
Map who shapes your pilot
Place each stakeholder by how much influence they have and how committed they are today. You get a next move for each one and a short engagement plan you can bring to your team.
- Add your stakeholders. Start from the suggested list or add your own. Use roles, such as "Board member 1". You can type names if you want to.
- Place each one. Choose influence and commitment today from the two lists, or drag the card on the grid.
- Plan the next move. Each quadrant suggests moves. Pick one and fill in what they need to hear, from whom, and by when.
- Keep it with your plan. Add the map to your plan, print it, or download it as Word.
Your map stays in this browser tab. Nothing leaves the page unless you send your plan. If you type people's names, they go with the plan when you send it, so roles are a good default.
Turn on JavaScript to build your own map. The four quadrants and their suggested moves are below.
1. Add your stakeholders
2. Place each one
Drag a card onto the grid, or use the two lists on each stakeholder below. Select a card on the grid to jump to its lists. Medium influence counts as high, and medium commitment counts as low, so anyone who can move the decision and is not yet on board lands in Win over.
Not placed yet
3. Plan the next move
Add a stakeholder in step 1 to start.
Your engagement plan
One line per stakeholder, grouped by quadrant. Start with the people in Keep close.
Place a stakeholder on the grid to see their line here.
Want help running a stakeholder session with your team? Schedule a conversation.
The four quadrants and their next moves
- Influence
- How much this person or group can move the decision, through a vote, a budget, staff, students or public voice. Could they stop or speed up the pilot?
- Commitment today
- How much they support the pilot right now, not how much they might later. If the vote were tomorrow, would they back it?
Keep close
High influence, high commitment
These are your champions. Give them real work and a defined role.
- Offer a governance seat: a program board where partners hold defined authority over program standards and work-based learning quality. Partnerships
- Name an anchor-institution candidate: one committed health system, manufacturer or builders association that can co-own the program, secured before students are promised placements. Partnerships
- Put commitments in writing: a signed MOU with named obligations, renewal terms and one point of contact on each side. Partnerships
- Ask them to host or speak at your shared-seeing event, so the community hears from its own employers and leaders. Board and community buy-in
Win over
High influence, low commitment
These people can stop the pilot. Learn their real concerns and let them see a working program.
- Give them a seeing-is-believing experience: a screening of Multiple Choice with a panel, or a site visit to a working program. Include skeptics, not only champions. After the film
- Brief leaders before the public event, for example a leadership pre-screening two weeks ahead, so they lead the discussion instead of reacting cold. Board and community buy-in
- Ask about private hesitations, not only public positions. Board and community buy-in
- Ask what would create real value for them, and listen for the honest answer. Partnerships
Keep informed
Low influence, high commitment
These supporters want to help. Give them a voice and a way to carry the message.
- Invite them onto the stakeholder team with leaders, teachers, counselors, employers, families and students. The Path
- Bring them into the visioning work, in more than one language and format, so their words shape the proposal. Board and community buy-in
- Ask them to bring others to the shared-seeing event. After the film
Monitor
Low influence, low commitment
Keep the door open and check again at each stage.
- Share the annual community report on who is participating and what is happening. Board and community buy-in
- Invite them to the shared-seeing event. After the film
- Recheck their place on the map when you move to the next stage of the path. The Path