Project highlights

“The client is happy with Simply Stakeholders. The process of adapting and maturing has revealed which functions are the most useful to them and, ultimately, it’s created a significant shift in terms of how the client manages their stakeholder engagement records.”

Joana Zaper, Simply Stakeholder Customer Success Team

Organization Background

Priding itself on supporting innovation and growth, this local government works to promote the vast and varied lifestyles that the area caters to.

Local Government stakeholder relationship management can be complex due to the breadth and depth of work Councils understake and the many touch points with their community and stakeholders.

The client’s lead for stakeholder engagement is dedicated to managing stakeholder relationships for around 1,700 capital infrastructure projects across the area. The team consists of 10 stakeholder engagement specialists, each assigned to diverse infrastructure and construction ready projects.

The Challenge: Changing Platforms and Team Adoption

Managing a huge volume of residents and visitors with diverse stakeholder needs, requires the Council to be agile and responsive. So as the Council’s focus evolved in response to stakeholder need, a new way to manage the relationships more comprehensively and efficiently was recognised. 

“The system that was in place worked really well for the original purpose that it was intended. But when the client’s SRM priorities changed, it was time for a more fit for purpose system,” said Joi, who works closely with the client.

Attempts to repurpose the existing system were explored. People still added information, but the system functions at the time no longer aligned with the work that the client was producing. 

Ultimately, they needed to make a decision about the continuity of the system. “In the end, they reverted to using spreadsheets,” said Joi, and explained the familiar yet undesirable situation of having to rely on asking people for their individual accounts and records of stakeholder interactions. The client’s centralized system had vanished, which slowed the work pace and increased the risk of potential errors.

It was less than ideal, but the client was confident this would be a short-term solution due to the systems in place being unsustainable for the team in terms of workload. Once the client made the call that long-term, effective change was needed, they were hellbent on finding an intuitive, easy-to-use stakeholder management platform that her team would find irresistible.  

The Solution: An Intuitive, User-Friendly Platform That Simplified Even Basic Stakeholder Management

Following an efficient and thorough process, Council staff dedicated five months to finding the right system for their needs.

Success meant finding a platform that:

1. The team would use consistently to establish a reliable, centralized record of all stakeholder engagement
2. Assisted with task management, improved productivity, and smoothed the workload process so tracking deliverables was easier
3. Was intuitive and user friendly. 

Aware that they were coming from a significantly different system, the client embraced the notion that they were working with a blank canvas. Potentially, they could create the ideal stakeholder engagement and management environment, so flexibility and adaptability would be an attractive draw.  

To make sure they found a solution that was sustainable, all system users were involved throughout the process. “The client explained that their team’s buy-in from the start was paramount,” said Joi. 

After the research phase was completed, the client concluded that Simply Stakeholders was the platform that suited them the most.

Outcomes: Positive Adoption and Centralized Data Lead to Speedier Data Discovery and Slick Report Creation

The client has been using Simply Stakeholders since late 2024, with the full rollout to the team occurring in early 2025. For them, it’s been a journey as they’ve been rebuilding and configuring their centralized registers, interactions, and embracing the opportunity to work with task tracking.

“In the first few months, the team focused on interactions with stakeholders, making sure they understood how to use the platform to get the basics right. The goal was to make using the system a positive habit,” said Joi. 

Using Simply Stakeholder has helped with:

• Stakeholder records and interaction: “In less than a year, the Council has gone from having a very small amount of centralized data to over 4,000 stakeholder records and 3,000 logged interactions.”
• Task management: “By recording all of their deliverables onto the system — fact sheets, project notifications, council briefings — they can easily see what activity is happening and what stage in the process a task is at.”
• Report creation: “The client finds it exceptionally easy to pull data. As a result, the reports they produce for management and for the team’s own records are very useful.”  

With positive signs that the platform is being used consistently, the client has turned its attention to the more advanced features, such as stakeholder mapping. 

“The client are working in the growth and maturing phase,” admits Joi, and is keen for the client to know there’s more the client can experiment with. But currently this Council is using the platform for:

• Stakeholder and interaction registers 
• Stakeholder mapping
• Task management
• Customized internal reporting
• Data management
• Sentiment tracking
• Complaints management. 

With such positive signs, the eventual plan is to roll out the use of Simply Stakeholders to other teams in Council. 

While the current configuration suits the needs of a single project stakeholder management team, flexibility within the platform allows for individual team customization. Without complicating things for other teams. The result is an ultimate single source of truth regarding stakeholder interactions.  

The Reality of Moving

Changing to a new platform, system, and way of working was a massive shift for this team. It would be remiss not to acknowledge the upheaval.

“The client was clearly excited to have Simply Stakeholders as a resource. But moving also presented a challenge,” says Joi of the onboarding process and initial few months. “At first, the client was presented us with more work as they created the systems they needed for operation, configured the platform, and created positive work habits,” says Joi. 

A massive task was facing the client. But they weren’t going it alone. Throughout the switch, they called on Joana, their dedicated Customer Success support advisor. 

“It was a pleasure to help with the client’s transition. Supporting them involved being available for calls, training sessions, and of course answering queries as they came through.”

The Wrap Up

For this Australian-based local government, Simply Stakeholders has helped with centralizing important stakeholder data that directly affects local projects. For a time, this data was difficult to access, which slowed processes and affected team performance and project delivery continuity. But with positive team adoption and consistent use, the centralization of key stakeholder data has smoothed processes, increasing team efficiency and accountability.

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To create a clear, easy-to-maintain repository of information about all important relationships for their team that would help them build understanding and consensus, Ottawa Police Service invested in Simply Stakeholders’ stakeholder engagement software.

The Challenge: Collating Stakeholder Data Into a Secure Central Source

The Ottawa Police Service Force (OPS) lacked a centrally managed data repository that could be universally accessed and used to manage relationships and meet their CSWB (Community Safety and Well-Being) Framework commitments. This need became increasingly apparent as the region went through a period of significant civil unrest following COVID-19.

At the time, they only had spreadsheets to record their data, and this limitation was hampering their efforts. Adding to the challenge, they had numerous staff in lockdown and were experiencing some staff turnover, which meant that their (often sensitive) stakeholder data and relationship histories were becoming fragmented and inaccessible.

The OPS needed an always-available, single source of truth that their staff could maintain using only their cell phones and home-office computers. They needed a solution that would be quick to set up, and that they could build on over time.

The Solution: An Adaptive SRM Platform With Integration Capabilities

After evaluating a number of options, Ottawa Police Service chose Simply Stakeholders as their relationship management solution. They determined the platform was the best fit due to its focus on creating a single source of truth, functioning as an IT system that would help them manage their central repository with all information and relationship profiles, including detailed stakeholder interactions, management, and analysis capabilities. Plus, the individual and role-based privileges would allow them to control who sees what data.

Other important features and capabilities initially implemented included:

• Task Boards – Each team could have its own task board, allowing them to create workflows from interactions and complaints and maintain to-do lists within the team
• Notifications – Users could receive push notifications when tasks are due

OPS’ implementation of Simply Stakeholders is still ongoing. The customer success team is supporting them to discover and implement additional features that will help them achieve their ultimate goal of creating a Relationship Portal for the entire OPS. This includes:

• Alerts – Setting these to pop up when opening relationship records to highlight key info for Senior Command and/or any major concerns to be aware of
• Keyword Search – Easily finding relationships or events via the search bar
• Tags – Using tags to quickly assign key stakeholder info, like associated OPS strategies and partnership opportunities
• Custom Fields – Adding any type of information to stakeholder profiles, such as lead contact, lead OPS unit, cultural sensitivities, or financial implications
• Timeline – Viewing a history of events, interactions, and follow up items for each stakeholder
• Analysis – Seeing insights into stakeholders using analysis, charts, and relationship health scores
• Files – Attaching minutes, MOUs, pictures, and other files to stakeholder records
• Feedback – Gathering stakeholder feedback via forms
• Dashboard – Seeing a quick overview of valuable information on stakeholders and the engagement

Outcomes: Improved Task Management and Data Access

Simply Stakeholders’ tools helped Ottawa Police Service quickly gain a clearer picture of who their key stakeholders are, while supporting key team members with visibility into stakeholder interactions, relationships, and what actions needed to be taken. Plus, it enabled an auditable data trail that showed what was said by who and when, allowing the team to evaluate and report on their stakeholder management activities, and apply their learnings to future events.

But there’s still so much more to come as the OPS continues to bring more data into Simply Stakeholders and implement its advanced features. This will unlock more efficiencies and insights for the team, and transform Simply Stakeholders into their go-to relationship data portal. 

Over the coming months, they plan to work through processes like information gathering, relationship mapping, and profile development. This will enable the team to analyze relationship-specific issues, identify causes of mistrust, map relationships for prioritization, and much more.

The Wrap Up

Simply Stakeholders are glad to have played a role in supporting Ottawa Police Service during a critical period and provide them with ongoing guidance as they implement new features and gain new insights into their stakeholder relationships.

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