What is an "Internal Stakeholder" Interview?

When Win Win meets with companies for the initial consultation generally it is because they have concerns about issues with people in their organization that are affecting or may affect their ability to achieve their business objectives. We listen to their concerns, get a picture of the organization from their perspective, have them tell us what the consequences might be if their concerns are not addressed, and understand what they hope to gain by doing something. This lets us know what they see as the "problem" that they want to address.

These problems, however, are often only symptoms of underlying issues that are visible to the business owners and executives. The underlying issues, the nature and causes of these symptoms, are revealed in a more thorough exploration of the company through our interviews with the "internal stakeholders": the managers and key employees in their companies. 

We conduct our interviews with a "blank slate" approach using a core set of questions that are tailored to ensure we capture information related to the concerns in the initial consultation. The core questions are organized around seven main topics:

• Information About the Employees (What do they do? How long have they been with the company? What do they see as the strengths they bring to the company?)

• The Company (What do they see as the company's strengths? Best practices? Changes they would like to see?)

• The Company Culture (What is it like being an employee for the company? What kind of things are rewarded/praised?)

• Recruitment and Retention (Are employees being motivated? Are their skills being used?)

• Communication Within the Company (Are responsibilities effectively communicated? Are the communication tools adequate?)

• Leadership Development (Are employees properly equipped and trained to handle their responsibilities? Is future leadership properly selected? Are there training opportunities?)

• Why Now? (Why is the company having us do these interviews now? Is there anything else we should know?)

Our questions cast a much wider net than one suggested by the presenting problems and essentially assesses the organization's health from a more holistic perspective and from the view of the employees. While our interviews are not confidential, they are anonymous so we are often able to gather information that employees are reluctant to share. We capture the "voices" of the organization and provide them within a report in a way that ensures that the source of the information is not identifiable.

This type of assessment picks up broader issues and systemic problems that are then easily seen by our clients, allowing us to work together on long-term solutions rather than quick fixes for crises or seemingly single-issue problems.