Speaker 1: Hello there, my name is Richard McMunn from the interview training website, PassMyInterview.com, and in this tutorial, I will teach you how to answer stakeholder management interview questions. These are really difficult questions to answer correctly, but they come up all the time during job interviews. So, if you have an interview coming up soon for any role or company, make sure you stay tuned because I promise to help you be the standout candidate. And to achieve that goal, this is what I will cover during this training tutorial. Number one, I will explain what stakeholders are and how you can manage their expectations in an organization. Number two, I will then give you a list of difficult stakeholder management interview questions that I strongly recommend you prepare for. Number three, I am then going to give you a top scoring example, unique answer to all of those stakeholder management interview questions. And then finally, number four, I will tell you where you can instantly download a copy of these slides, including the questions and answers and also extra resources to help you be a great manager and leader. And just very quickly, if you are new to the channel, please make sure you hit that subscribe button. It's really important. By subscribing, I can help you not just pass every job interview you ever attend. I can also help you to negotiate a pay rise and progress throughout your career. And please just give the video like, hit that like button, because that tells me you find these tutorials useful. Thank you very much indeed. OK, to begin with, what is a stakeholder? We need to fully understand what a stakeholder is before we can answer the questions. Let me give you an explanation. So a stakeholder is a person who has an interest or concern in a business or organization. Now, there are two categories of stakeholder, and these are internal and external. Most people think there's just external stakeholders. There's not. There's internal and external stakeholders. So internal stakeholders include employees, team members, managers and leaders, company owners and shareholders. And external stakeholders are generally suppliers, contractors, government agencies and creditors. So that's the first thing to remember. There are two categories of stakeholder, internal and external. And if we look at this in diagrammatic format, we have a company and then we have internal stakeholders and external. So employees, managers, company owners and shareholders, and externally, contractors, suppliers, customers, government agencies and creditors. Now, all stakeholders are just as important because they all have, an interest in the company or organization, and you have to manage their expectations. So let's now take a look at a number of difficult stakeholder management interview questions, the type of questions that come up all the time during job interviews. I will then give you two tips to help you answer each question correctly, and then an example unique response. So the first stakeholder management interview question that comes up all the time is, how would you manage stakeholder expectations? So if you think about this, you have internal and external stakeholders. How are you going to manage all of their expectations? Tip number one. So this first stakeholder management interview question is obviously assessing your leadership and management capabilities. Now, my advice is to make sure you have a set number of steps you follow for managing stakeholder expectations before your interview. I always use, five steps for managing stakeholder expectations. Tip number two. Now, your steps should include, first of all, identifying who your stakeholders are and their expectations, how often you will communicate with each stakeholder, and how you will assess their response to your communication, because it's really important you build long-term positive relationships with all of the stakeholders, because they will then help you to achieve the company's mission and strategy. Let me give you an example answer. This is how I would answer that difficult question. How would you manage stakeholder expectations? Here we go. In my experience, there are five steps to managing stakeholder expectations. Step one is to identify who your stakeholders are and determine their expectations. Now, each stakeholder will have different expectations, and they will need to be managed in a specific way. Step two is to have a plan for how you're going to manage your stakeholders. Step three is to have a plan for keeping each stakeholder in the loop. Now, the same information should not be shared with all stakeholders. I would only share applicable, useful, factual, and relevant information with each stakeholder, depending on their needs. Now, step three is to ensure you share information with stakeholders on a regular and consistent basis. So, for example, I would share information with internal stakeholders more frequently than external ones. Step four is to make sure you provide, value every time you contact a stakeholder. Now, without stakeholders, a business cannot exist. So, value should be your priority every time. Now, finally, step five is to keep a track of sentiment. Now, this means assessing the reaction to the information you are providing each stakeholder to ensure they are suitably informed, motivated, and on your side. That's a really good answer. It shows you to be a competent leader and manager who can easily manage expectations of all company, and organizational stakeholders. Now, you can either pause the video if you want to and write down these questions and answers as we work through them together. Or if you wait, I will soon tell you where you can download all of these slides and use them during your preparation for your interview or when you want to improve your ability to manage stakeholders in an organization. Here's the next question. How do you build strong professional relationships with stakeholders? Another difficult question. This next stakeholder management interview question assesses your interpersonal skills and whether you appreciate how important it is to build strong relationships with stakeholders. As I mentioned previously, they are vital to the effective and efficient running of an organization. So, you have to take the time to build really strong relationships with them. Tip number two, in your answer, reference the fact that you value the importance of face-to-face communication with stakeholders and state that you will assess which stakeholders have the highest level of influence in an organization. So, two things there. Whenever you are building relationships with stakeholders, try as much as possible to have face-to-face, one-on-one communication because they will feel more valued as opposed to email or telephone. And also state that you assess which ones have the highest level of influence, okay? Because that will determine how much time you spend building relationships with stakeholders. Here's my example response. How do you build relationships with stakeholders? How do you build relationships with stakeholders? How do you build relationships with stakeholders? Strong professional relationships with stakeholders. Here we go. I would start by gaining an understanding of the organization's stakeholders, their needs, and determine which ones have the highest level of power or influence. I would aim to hold one-to-one conversations with stakeholders whenever possible to ensure clarity of communication. Now, although email is a highly useful form of communication, one-to-one is more powerful when building strong relationships because it makes a stakeholder feel valued. Now, I would take steps to understand the stakeholders' position and viewpoint and always communicate with honesty and clarity. Now, finally, whenever building relationships with stakeholders, I would demonstrate my level of competence, which would in turn provide reassurance and stability. That's another really good answer. Now, don't go anywhere because I still have more questions and answers to give you. But when you're ready, click that link in the top right-hand corner of the video. Head through to my website, courseslides.com. And I'll see you in the next video. Courseslides.com. It's a new website and you can instantly download a copy of these slides and additional bonuses and resources to help you be a brilliant manager and leader. So you get an exact copy of these slides to save you writing them down. Here's the next question. How do you stay organized when working with stakeholders? Tip number one. So this is another difficult but common stakeholder management interview question that often catches people out. Can you imagine being in your interview? And they fire this question at you and you're thinking off the top of your head, how do I stay organized when working with stakeholders? Well, I will give you an example structure to use. So in your answer, state that you will organize your work based on the mission and objectives of the organization. That's important. And tip number two, you can then go on to say that you will work closely with those stakeholders who enable you to achieve the company's mission much faster. Here's my example response. How do you stay organized when working with stakeholders? I stay organized by determining the strategic goals of the organization and drawing up a list of the tasks and projects I am responsible for. I then analyze my priorities against the organization's objectives and ensure I work and communicate with those stakeholders that are best positioned to help me achieve my goals. Now, whilst working with numerous stakeholders and keeping them engaged, I'm also working with those stakeholders who are best positioned to help me achieve my goals. Having the ability to justify and back up your decisions against the company's mission makes things easier. So that shows you to be a decisive leader who can easily stay organized when working with stakeholders. And as I mentioned, I would always work more closely with those stakeholders who enable me to achieve the company's mission much faster. Next question. What would you do if your stakeholders had conflicting views during an important meeting? Tip number one. This interview question is assessing your conflict management capabilities. Now, it is imperative you give a confident answer that demonstrates your ability to communicate and negotiate with stakeholders effectively. Tip number two. The best approach, in my opinion, when dealing with stakeholder conflicting views is to try to reframe the conversation as a problem-solving exercise so that a consensus is reached. So a consensus is where everyone generally agrees. So you're trying to encourage them to come to the viewpoint themselves that that's the best way of working. So you reframe the conversation as a problem-solving exercise. Here's my example response. What would you do if your stakeholders had conflicting views during an important meeting? I would listen to each stakeholder's concerns, ask questions to gain clarity of their viewpoint, show appreciation for their position, and then seek to reframe the conflict as a problem-solving exercise. I would ask the stakeholders open questions based on the objectives we wanted to achieve and encourage everyone to find common ground. Now, my aim would be to use effective communication, questioning and negotiating skills to achieve an outcome and consensus we all agreed with. So let's assume you're in a meeting and the lady on the left there has a conflicting viewpoint to someone else. You can ask a simple open-ended question that goes, can you help me understand how your viewpoint, enables us to achieve the company's mission? So that's using effective communication skills to ask a question to get them to explain how their conflicting viewpoint enables you all to achieve the company's mission. So you're getting them to understand the company's mission and eventually everyone should come together and reach the consensus, the general opinion of what you are going to do together to achieve the goal of the organization. Let's now move on to the next question. Tell me about a time when you were in a meeting and you were able to achieve the goal of the organization. Tell me about a time you convinced a stakeholder to understand your perspective at work. Tip number one. So this next stakeholder management interview question is once again assessing your communication skills. Now, it is easy to tell a stakeholder you are going to do things your way, but a great leader and manager will seek to convince people their methods are the best. Tip number two, the most effective way to encourage a stakeholder to see your perspective is to ask them questions that lead them to your way of working. Here's my example answer. Tell me about a time you convinced a stakeholder to understand your perspective at work. I was holding a team meeting discussing the action plan for an important client-based project. Now, two internal stakeholders suggested we could save money by using a cheaper substandard product for the project. Now, they argued we could save $3,000 taking this approach, which would make the project more profitable for us and the client would never know. They disagreed with this proposal. To make them understand my perspective, I asked them two questions. My first question was, how would they feel if they were the client paying a high fee for a project that they later found out had included a substandard product part? My second question was, what would happen to the organization's reputation if people found out that we had cut corners? Just by asking those two simple questions, the stakeholders quickly saw things from my perspective and they agreed. Their idea was not workable. That's a great answer. It shows you to be a clever manager and leader who is able to influence people by using effective communication skills of just asking two basic, simple questions. You get people to come around to your perspective by asking the right questions. The next question, tell me about a time when you used effective communication skills to win over a stakeholder who was initially reluctant to your method of working. Wow, this is a difficult one. Tip number one, this next stakeholder management interview question is assessing your negotiation and influencing skills, two skills that are imperative to effective management and leadership. Tip number two, my advice is to give a specific situation you have been in where you demonstrated confidence in your decision-making process and where you took the time to explain to the stakeholder why your way of working was in the best interest of the organization. Here's my example answer to assist you. Tell me about a time when you used effective communication skills to win over a stakeholder who was initially reluctant to your method of working. Here we go. In a previous role, one of the company owners challenged my decision not to recruit a member of staff they had recommended. I acknowledged his frustrations and set about explaining in clear terms why I felt the individual was not suitably qualified or experienced to help us achieve the company's objectives. I explained that in my opinion, they would require several months training and mentoring, which would tie up valuable resources that were needed elsewhere. I then explained that I had given the individual feedback and a checklist of the areas they needed to develop and told them we would reconsider them for a position once they had met the minimum criteria. Now, after explaining my thought process and how I had put the needs of the business first, they agreed it was the right decision to make. So that's a great example answer. And what's good about it is that it's not just a matter of how you do it. It's a matter of how you do it. You are putting the needs of the organization first, and you are then acknowledging the other person's viewpoint, but then explaining why you made the decision that you did. So it's a really good example answer. So the next thing to do is to click that link right now in the top right-hand corner of the video, head straight through to my website, courseslides.com, and you can instantly download a copy of these slides that will help you prepare for your interview. These slides are great if you want to learn more about stakeholder management as well. Head through to that website. Finally, don't forget to give the video a like. I really do appreciate your support. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. I've put my LinkedIn link in the description below the video, and it's always an honor and a pleasure to connect with like-minded professionals such as yourself. And don't forget to subscribe to the channel. By subscribing, I can help you not just pass every job interview you ever attend. I can help you negotiate a salary, get a pay rise, get promoted, progress throughout your career. I am here to help you. Please hit that subscribe button. Thank you so much for watching, and I wish you all the best for passing your interview. Have a great day.