Include All The Stake Holders

If you do not include all the stakeholders in the project design, then you will create a project with hidden and unknown requirements. These will come out during the project execution and create unforeseen delays. This failure is the cause of a great many failed or seriously delayed projects. -- RaySchneider

Excellent observation, unintentionally or intentionally ignoring stakeholders is high on the list of risky things to do project-wise. However, would anyone like to make comments on the TyrannyOfTheMajorityStakeholder? This is often the person in charge of the purse strings or a politically powerful but somewhat clueless stakeholder in the project who tends to be overbearing in their requests or contributions. Often, however, it is the development team members themselves. -- DionHinchcliffe

We might amend the statement to Include all of the necessary stakeholders. Leave out the overbearing stakeholder for decisions that do not affect his area. Also, out of kindness, do not force individual stakeholders to sit through decisions that do not affect them.

What about the case when stakeholders requirements are incompatible? This can lead to inconsistencies in the project analysis.

Either the incompatibilities need to be resolved, or we have discovered the need for two projects to cover different situations.

Advice from GettingToYes is good for negotiating incompatible requirements. We frequently just forget to include certain stakeholders - they don't get invited to the meeting - this can frequently be solved by sending an e-mail to everyone ("Here's the latest spec, what do you guys think?" "Why wasn't I invited to this meeting?" "Ok, let's have another meeting.") ; or the true stakeholder sends a representative who doesn't adequately represent the true stakeholder's needs. -- JamieFristrom