Stakeholder Identification & Mapping

Identification is an active, ongoing investigation. The first list a Champion gives you is almost always incomplete — not from deceit, but because committees evolve and informal influence is invisible from the inside.

• The Champion — ask explicitly: 'Who else weighs in?' 'Who would the EB call before deciding?' 'Who derailed the last vendor?'
• LinkedIn — reporting lines, recent hires (signals investment areas), tenure patterns
• Public statements — earnings calls and investor days name strategic owners
• Past RFPs and case studies — reveal the function that historically owns this category
• Conversation intelligence — Gong/Chorus search for names mentioned but not yet engaged
• Calendar invites — every new attendee is a new stakeholder to map

Two complementary maps:

1. Org Chart — formal reporting, useful for understanding accountability and approval chains
2. Influence Map — directional arrows of who influences whom, drawn from Champion conversations

The Power Map is the overlay: each node scored on formal authority and informal power. The gap between the two maps is where deals are won or lost.

• The Champion needs to 'check with someone' before answering a substantive question
• Pre-meetings happen that you are not invited to
• Decisions reverse between meetings without new information
• A new name appears in CC lines without introduction
• The EB references a perspective you have not heard ('our security team has concerns about…')
• The Champion uses 'we' for opinions you suspect are not theirs

Update after every meaningful interaction. Re-baseline at every stage gate. Reorgs, leadership changes, and budget cycles invalidate maps quickly — a six-month-old stakeholder map at a Fortune 500 is fiction.

A team mapped 7 stakeholders on a $3M deal and felt confident. Conversation intelligence flagged a name mentioned 11 times across calls but never engaged: the EB's chief of staff, who wrote the briefing memo for every executive decision. The seller arranged a 30-minute briefing. The chief of staff became the most consequential supporter of the deal — and would have been a silent Detractor if ignored.