Many businesses, or public services, face the difficulty that their stakeholders include those with completely opposite interests.
But nowhere is this more obvious than in the thorny problem of building infrastructure.
It is a clear priority for the UK, because we are convincing ourselves that we have lost the ability to build. We watch the latest pictures from China or Japan and marvel at their latest, fastest, cleanest trains. We read about their amazing speed of construction and reflect upon the headlines that suggest that we have taken longer consulting about the Lower Thames Crossing than others have taken to build a whole railway.
The case for faster delivery
When 250 infrastructure planning practitioners met in London in February for their annual get-together, accelerating such Nationally Significant Infrastructure projects was much on their minds. The NSIP Forum reflected upon significant changes made by the Planning & Infrastructure Act, all designed to prevent undue delays caused by excessive public engagement and by protracted judicial reviews.
The new arrangements remove the statutory requirements for pre-application consultations, giving project developers more flexibility in their dialogues with affected communities. Onerous rules about how these should be run have, unfortunately, led to many ‘tick-box’ exercises. In theory, relaxing these should make fewer consultations more meaningful. Time will tell.
The stakeholder dilemma
The whole debate throws into sharp focus the ultimate dilemma that major infrastructure projects face: how to interface with entirely different stakeholders.
For when it comes to a major new nuclear power station, a vast offshore wind farm, a new airport runway, a railway line, a road or reservoir, we are all, in a sense, stakeholders. These are investments determined by democratically elected governments to be required for the nation. The clue is in the terminology - ‘nationally significant’.
Since the 2008 Planning Act, there are National Policy Statements or NPSs for each type of infrastructure, and the idea was to settle any argument as to whether we needed to make the investment.
In theory, that would have removed the temptation to repeat the argument about the national requirement every time we tried to build something. After all, each NPS would have been subject to a nationwide consultation, so, in principle, we all had a say.
Why engagement often falls short
It never quite worked. Most of the NPSs were published by the Coalition Government, and the consultations were largely inadequate.
In the case of Airports, divisions at the cabinet level led to a six-year delay in publishing the document. Even when organised well, consultations struggled to attract anyone without an industry-specific interest. After all, few of us are sufficiently interested in the UK-wide picture. When, however, there is a threat to build something near us, then it’s different. From being passive, disinterested stakeholders, we become passionate, anxious opponents!
This is the scenario that confronts specialist engagement firms that support major project sponsors as they seek Development Consent Orders – the mechanism whereby the Government gives the go-ahead for each scheme. They need to demonstrate to the Planning Inspectorate that communities have been meaningfully consulted. It’s a tough task.
They will have conducted a diligent stakeholder mapping exercise. This will have shown that many people would have been in the bottom-right quadrant – heavily impacted but lacking much real influence. They will have tried hard to engage with them – sent them as much information as they could reasonably be expected to absorb, invited them to attend drop-in centres, and provided online opportunities to raise very specific questions.
Each interaction will have been meticulously documented using systems like Tractivity; every submission acknowledged; every query answered. Very occasionally, the project is changed in some minor way. In general, however, it is rare for anything important to change.
Little wonder that many controversial infrastructure projects leave consultees deeply disenchanted. It must also be demoralising for those conducting the engagement.
Four stakeholder management lessons
What stakeholder management lessons can we derive from such challenging situations? And are there any solutions?
1. Communities are complex, and it is dangerous to generalise.
Mapping at a ‘generic’ level misses many nuances. Groups that appear to be impacted in the same way may in fact be subject to different forces. Age, socio-economic circumstances, education, health and other variables affect an individual’s perceptions.
Using one-size-fits-all communications - such as the ubiquitous leaflet mailshot - is not going to be equally effective. Genuine and successful dialogue needs to accommodate specific individual circumstances.
2. Stakeholder dissatisfaction often stems not from the process itself, but from mistrust of the project promoters.
The public suspects that these organisations absolutely must secure ‘consent’ in the sense of obtaining the Government’s decision to proceed. They think they are being ‘sold to’, that consultants are contractually bound to listen, but have no incentive to bite the hands that feed them.
Is there a case for finding a more independent body to conduct infrastructure consultations? The Planning Inspectorate, possibly? Or the relevant Local authority?
3. Might we be focusing too much on the most proximate stakeholders?
If, by definition, nationally significant projects confer benefits on a wider part of the population, but only ever consult those who are most seriously and adversely affected, is it surprising that we institutionalise opposition?
The Prime Minister is on record as referring to them as ‘blockers’, but the truth is that advocates in favour of projects are seldom heard. More should be done to identify them and ensure their voices are heard alongside those who will, naturally, be opposed.
4. Major infrastructure can involve an extended timeline.
The views of people and communities can evolve over the years. Vehement opposition and anger can dissipate over time as unpalatable projects become familiar and mitigation measures start to take effect.
In a world of winners and losers, it should be the goal of responsible developers and Government agencies to make the best possible attempts to ameliorate the worst impacts of the project.
Far-sighted promoters will recognise the need to develop long-term relationships with the most vulnerable groups, businesses and families from the word ‘go’. At a later stage, when project implementation raises a host of new and different issues, a solid, mature relationship can help.
The scale of the challenge ahead
The Ten-Year Infrastructure Strategy, published in 2025, envisages an ambitious programme of projects, driven by aggressive electrification and the switch to greener energy sources. Some areas are more directly affected than others.
Lincolnshire, for example, geographically situated at the point where so many offshore wind farms make landfall, has to host almost more DCOs than the rest of the East of England put together. The same stakeholders are often affected. Imagine the complexities of several parallel dialogues with different development companies – working to their own standards and in their own ways.
It illustrates the growing belief that stakeholder management becomes one of the pivotal skills needed to build better infrastructure – and faster. Recruiting and training one thousand new stakeholder managers and equipping them with powerful systems should be a national priority. Men and women whose calling will be to understand and empathise with a huge range of stakeholder interests and help manage the inevitable trade-offs.
The newly-formed National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (NISTA) is meant to identify skills shortages and alleviate bottlenecks.
Based on the discussions at this year’s NSIP Forum, the profession faces plenty of issues and needs a new influx of talent and know-how, supported by the right solutions to address the immense public engagement challenge.
