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4. Building Your Stakeholder Register

 Building Your Stakeholder Register
==================================

Updated 4 weeks ago · 5 min read

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This article builds the register itself. Work through the steps in order, because each one gives the next something to point at.

You need the **Stakeholder Manager** role or higher. If SRM is not in your left menu, see [SRM Roles](/articles/srm-roles).

1. Decide what a stakeholder record holds
-----------------------------------------

Do this before you enter anyone. Every record you create, import or capture from a form maps onto these fields, and adding them later means going back over records you have already made.

SRM gives you the fields most teams need: name, description, contact cards, influence, interest, sentiment, relationship owners, initiatives, groups and a team. Anything else your team tracks (a portfolio, a policy area, a jurisdiction, a consent flag) you add yourself as a **custom field**.

1. From the left menu, open **Settings**, then **SRM**, then **Stakeholders**.
2. Under **Custom fields**, click **Add input** and pick a field type.
3. Fill in the **Question**. That is the label your team will see.
4. Save. Repeat for organisations and initiatives if they need their own fields.

![The Custom fields section of the SRM Stakeholders settings page with two fields defined](https://engage.knowledge.civ.io/storage/xj9eekMF0oc3mt5PAqAeNQ4zSjDnvj9R1I19qsl2.png)

A **Drop-down** field filters as a multiselect of its own options; a text field filters on a partial match only. [Custom fields for SRM records](/articles/custom-fields-for-srm-records) covers each field type.

If you are migrating existing lists rather than starting fresh, read [Getting your stakeholder data into SRM](/articles/getting-your-stakeholder-data-into-srm) before you go further.

2. Create your organisations
----------------------------

Most stakeholders represent a body, so build that list first. Nothing in SRM merges two organisation records, so settle a naming convention before you start.

![Navigating to the Organisations list from the SRM menu and opening the create form](/storage/1g3ZTedX6rbRJ9goUBs7Bo0henmtDPhZy97jZyhf.gif)

1. Click **Organisations** in the SRM menu, then the **+** icon.
2. Enter the **Title** and a short **Description**.
3. Add **Owner(s)** if someone on your team leads the relationship with this body.
4. Save.

Leave **Contacts** empty for now. An organisation's contacts are links to stakeholder records, so they come after the next step. See [Organisations](/articles/organisations).

3. Create your first stakeholders
---------------------------------

![Navigating to the Stakeholders list from the SRM menu and opening the create form](/storage/O5zmRU8SUvGkB6MDejVnMBxEMGNFgnFEWzssT5Tv.gif)

1. Click **Stakeholders**, then the **+** icon.
2. Enter the **Name**, and a **Description** saying who they are and why they matter.
3. Add a **contact**: pick the **Organisation** you just created, then the job title, email and phone. Choose **None/Personal** if they are not acting for a body.
4. Set **Influence level**, **Interest level** and **Sentiment**.
5. Set **Relationship Owner(s)**: one or more people on your team.
6. Fill in your custom fields, then **Save changes**.

![Setting the influence level and sentiment on the stakeholder form](/storage/WSFtHT7zQad83pankyke9jnwiyxxlorVw1FDAHzh.gif)

### The three scores

Influence, interest and sentiment are set by your team rather than calculated. SRM combines high influence with negative sentiment into a risk score, which is what drives the **Stakeholders Needing Attention** widget. All three are also filters, columns and export fields.

### If they already have an account

Where a contact email matches a user account on your engagement site, a **Website user** badge appears beside it, linking to that profile. There is nothing to switch on. From then on, what they do on the public site lands on this timeline. See [Users and stakeholders in SRM](/articles/users-and-stakeholders-in-srm).

### One person, two organisations

Add a second **contact** card, not a second stakeholder. Someone who works for one body and also chairs a community group is one person with one history, and SRM does not deduplicate or merge records.

4. Segment with groups
----------------------

Groups are your own slicing of the register: *Workshop attendees Round 1*, *Affected landowners*, *Industry representatives*. A stakeholder can be in any number of them, and groups are used to filter, target and report on a cohort.

![Creating a stakeholder group from the SRM menu](/storage/mpMb9ewhwG13JXlnsGr2PGa7grZwzOBrb52KnugR.gif)

1. Click **Stakeholder groups**, then the **+** icon.
2. Give it a **Title** and a **Description** saying what the criteria for inclusion are.
3. Save, then attach stakeholders from the **Group(s)** field on each stakeholder's Edit tab, or in bulk from the stakeholders list.

See [Groups](/articles/groups).

5. Set up an initiative
-----------------------

An initiative is the programme of work that ties stakeholders, interactions, issues and tasks together: a consultation, a campaign, a policy process.

![Setting the status on the initiative form as it moves through its lifecycle](/storage/Xz4zqDcNKiA9bOcTRpZHPRzIw8X0lK5ig63mxio7.gif)

1. Click **Initiatives**, then the **+** icon.
2. Enter the **Title** and leave **Status** as **Planning**. Move it to Active, On Hold or Completed as the work progresses.
3. Set the **Start Date** and **End Date**, and add a **Description** covering objectives and scope.
4. Add **Owner(s)**.
5. If your engagement site runs projects and there is a matching one, link it under **Engage project(s)**. This is what connects a public consultation to its stakeholder context.
6. Save.

Then link your stakeholders to it from the **Initiative(s)** field on each stakeholder's Edit tab.

![The stakeholder Edit screen with the Initiative(s) field in the sidebar highlighted](https://engage.knowledge.civ.io/storage/WjRWYBqY3IBifxlOJUYIVKxfwtoItQ9vz3aciWyC.png)

See [Initiatives](/articles/initiatives).

6. Set ownership and access
---------------------------

Two different fields, doing two different jobs.

Field

What it does

**Relationship Owner(s)** / **Owner(s)**

Records who leads the relationship. Drives dashboards and filters. **Does not restrict access.**

**Team**

Controls who can see and edit the record. One team per record; no team means everyone can see it.

Team restriction is off by default, and can be switched on per site or per team. See [Teams in SRM](/articles/teams-in-srm) for how to choose between a shared register and team-restricted records.

Other ways to add records
-------------------------

Beyond typing records in one at a time:

- **Migrating existing lists**: [Getting your stakeholder data into SRM](/articles/getting-your-stakeholder-data-into-srm)
- **Letting people add themselves**: [Capturing stakeholders from a survey](/articles/capturing-stakeholders-from-a-survey)
- **Assigning groups, initiatives, owners or teams to a cohort at once**: [Filtering, columns and bulk updates in SRM](/articles/filtering-columns-and-bulk-updates-in-srm)

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