Stakeholder Engagement: A Review of Sydney Airport Runway Project

This literature review examines stakeholder engagement in the context of the Sydney Airport runway project. It highlights the importance of stakeholder involvement for the project's success, particularly in light of the airport's privatization and the need to balance economic benefits with community concerns. The review identifies key stakeholders, including investors, government entities, airlines, airport operators, and local communities. It details the stakeholder mapping process, emphasizing the importance of identifying, analyzing, mapping, and prioritizing stakeholders based on their influence, legitimacy, and willingness to engage. The review also explores various methods for engaging stakeholders, such as stakeholder focus groups, to gather input and address concerns related to the runway construction.

Running head: STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT
Stakehoklder engagement
Name of Student:
Name of College:
Authors Note:
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Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Literature Review............................................................................................................................3
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................15
References......................................................................................................................................16
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Introduction
The Sydney Airport is a very vital airport in context to the economy of Australia as it is very
busy and important location in Australia with regards to doing business in Australia. The Sydney
Airport is a flight station for the Qantas Airways and it is also a busy location offering back and
forth services and connecting various important locations of the world. Given its popularity and
huge economic benefit associated with it was very essential for the privatization of the Australian
Airport Services as it will help in attracting more funds from private sector which will not only
result in meeting the expectations of the passengers but will also help in increasing the benefits
of the stakeholders in addition to benefitting local communities. From engineering aspect it is
very necessary to construct a new runway in the Sydney Airport in order to meet the demands of
the ever increasing number of flights and also to provide better landing and take-off options to
the aircraft carriers with various new tyre technology with greater passenger capacity and
therefore it has become very important to involve the stakeholders in order to gain knowledge,
inputs and learn about the perception of the different group of stakeholders which would help in
the success of the construction of the runway project.
Literature Review
It is very important to engage stakeholders and community partners in the development of
Sydney airport as the involvement of the stakeholders are beneficial to the Sydney Airport
Authority and also because they play an important role in influencing the interests and issues of
the project undertaken by the authority. The authority is also of the perception that that the
effective participation of the stakeholders in the planning and effective delivering of
infrastructure will help in bringing out the best social, economic and environmental outcome.
The Sydney Airport authority is one of the major airports in the country as it helps in governing a
section of the Australian economy and therefore it needs to operate with a variety of
organizations with different business models. The main aim of the Sydney Airport Authority is
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to provide maximum benefits to the passengers while also fulfilling the expectations of the
stakeholders. The Sydney Airport Authority needed to undergo a change in business model in
order to shift their focus from passenger benefit to passenger returns and maximizing stakeholder
returns after the Australian Airport services got privatized in nature from being public services in
nature. The privatization raised various issues in the Australian Airport services due to various
reasons among which the main was increase in the price of the air services and accordingly the
Sydney Airport was sold to Southern Cross Airports Corporation Holdings Limited in 2002 and
it also employed majority of the Sydney workforce in 2009.
Identification of Stakeholders
The stakeholders who are identified for engagement regarding the proposition of the new runway
in the Sydney Airport includes the investors who exhibits significance influence and control the
development and daily operations of the airport, the federal government of Australia and state
government under which the airport belong as it controls the various border security issues, noise
issues and various environmental aspects of the air transport industry and are also responsible for
designing various legal laws, legislations, regulations and standards which the air transport
industry needs to abide by, the airlines company who provides passenger facilitation and
transport services in the airport, the private airport operator or authority who acts on behalf of the
investors of the sir transport industry, oversees the day to day operations of the businesses and
also provide the stakeholders of the airport what they require to operate within the complexity of
the airport. The private airport operator or authority also aim in working in collaboration with the
local communities as it is the communities that seems to have little gain from proximity to
airport operations and perhaps much to lose in welfare and quality of life from the extra noise,
traffic activity and air pollution which an airport generates. The other important stakeholder
group which should be involved in stakeholder engagement process are the communities
surrounding the airport as they get affected the most doe to the operations of the airport and also
because they voice their concern over undesirable social effects of the operations of the airport
and accepts various desirable effects such as working opportunities.
Stakeholder mapping procedure
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As stated by Mcallister, Oyedele & Kelly (2013) stakeholder mapping is the second step in the
five step approach of stakeholder engagement. Stakeholder mapping of stakeholders is
considered as very important in stakeholder engagement process as it helps in understanding that
the key stakeholders of a project or initiative are and what those stakeholders are looking for in
the project. In order to make stakeholder mapping more effective in nature, it should be driven
by an engagement strategy.
Stakeholder Mapping is a collective process of research, debate and discussion which draws
from multiple perspectives in order to identify and determine a key list of stakeholders across the
entire stakeholder spectrum. The process of stakeholder mapping can be divided in to the
following phases namely identifying which involves listing the relevant groups, organizations,
and people involved in a particular initiative or project, analysing which involves understanding
the relevant perspectives and view point of the stakeholders identified, mapping which helps in
visualizing relationships to objectives and other stakeholders and prioritizing which involves
ranking stakeholder relevance and identifying their various issues.
The first step in the mapping process involves understanding that there is no magic list of
stakeholders for a company or for a project. According to Bendell (2017) the final list of
stakeholders will depend on the project and the business, its impact and the current engagement
activities of the project and therefore it ought not to remain static in nature. The list of
stakeholders will keep on changing as the environment around the project and the business
evolves and based on that whether the stakeholders change their opinion or decisions. The action
which is involved in the identification of stakeholders is brainstorming a list of stakeholders
without screening and including everyone who has an interest or stake in the objective of a
project or business in the current time and who may have interest in the same in the future.
The second process in the stakeholder mapping process is analysing after the identification of the
stakeholders which involves further analysis of the stakeholders in order to understand in a more
effective way the relevance of the stakeholders and the perspective that they offer to the project
or business. It also helps in understanding their relationship to the issue and to each other and
also to prioritize based on their relative usefulness for this engagement. There are various criteria
which help in the analysis of identified stakeholders which are as follows:
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Contribution- Does the stakeholder group possess the information, expertise or counsel on the
various issues of the projects which could be helpful for the project?
Legitimacy- How legitimate is the claim of the stakeholder or the stakeholder group regarding
engagement with the project?
Willingness to Engage- How willing is the stakeholder or the group of stakeholder to engage
with the project?
Influence- What influences and how much influence does the stakeholder have and who they are
able to influence?
Necessity of involvement- Is the stakeholder someone or somebody who could derail or
delegitimize the project or could affect the project in a negative manner.
The action which can be followed with respect to this step is using the above mentioned criteria’s
to design and populate a chart with short descriptions of how stakeholders fulfil them. The chart
will help in assigning values such as low, medium and high to the stakeholders which later help
in deciding which stakeholders to engage in the planning of the project.
As stated by Andriof et al. (2017) the third process in the stakeholder mapping process is
mapping, as mapping the stakeholders of a project is a virtual exercise and analysis tool which
can be used effectively to determine which stakeholder groups are most useful to engage with
during the project. The process of mapping helps in allowing to visualize where the stakeholder
stand and belong when analysed by the same key criteria and compared to each other and also
helps in visualizing the regular complex interplay of issues and relationships which are created in
the criteria. The action which is involved in the mapping process is drawing a mapping in order
to identify the stakeholders. The steps to create an effective mapping of stakeholders are as
follows:
 Drawing a quadrant by using two labelled as low to high.
 Adding Expertise, Willingness and values in the criteria chart.
 Assigning expertise variable to the Y axis and willingness variable to the X axis.
 Discussing and debating within the group in which quadrant a particular stakeholder falls.
 Plotting the stakeholders on the grid.
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 Using small, medium and large circles in order to represent the value of the stakeholders.
 Using arrows in order to depict influence and relationships among the stakeholders.
The fourth process in the stakeholder mapping process involves prioritizing stakeholder and
identifying various issues as it is not advisable and un-necessary to engage with all the
stakeholder groups of a project with the same level of intensity all the time as it leads to wastage
of resources and time regarding the project. According to Higgs et al. (2018) it is very important
to become strategic and clear in nature regarding whom and why the project is engaging with
before jumping in a project as it helps in saving both time and money regarding a project and its
implementation. The action which is followed in this process involves looking closely at the
issues of the stakeholders and deciding accordingly whether the stakeholder group are materials
of engagement in a particular project and its objectives and various questions such as what are
the issues for the priority stakeholders, which issues do most of the stakeholders frequently
express and are the actual issues logical and relevant to the engagement objectives of the project
should be asked and answered.
In addition to combining of the criteria chart and the mapping chart it is very important to use
materiality in order to rank the stakeholders into a prioritized engagement list which will help in
capturing the most relevant stakeholders and their most relevant issues.
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Fig: Approach/Tactics of stakeholder mapping
The above figure helps in depicting quadrant tactics which are used for the project
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CommunicateEngageInformMonitorHigh
High
Low
Low
SH3
SH2
SH4 SH5
SH1
Willingness
Expertise
Circle size-value
Low
Low
High
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Fig: Stakeholder Mapping of Sydney Airport Runway
Source: (Author)
The above chart depicts the stakeholder mapping regarding the construction of proposed runway
in the Sydney Airport. The various stakeholder or stakeholder groups which are involved in the
process and numbered accordingly are as follows:
SH1- Investors
SH2- Airport Operators
SH3- Airlines
SH4- Federal Government and state Government
SH5- Local Community
Methods of Engaging stakeholders
As stated by Bell, Bricker, Tzou, Lee and Van Horne (2012) successful stakeholder engagement
refers to engaging with a wide range of project stakeholders. There are various ways to engage
with stakeholders. The following approaches are considered the most beneficial and effective
approaches regarding engagement with the stakeholders in order to understand the reaction,
perception inputs and knowledge regarding the construction of the new proposed runway in the
Sydney Airport.
Stakeholder Focus Group- The engagement with the important and interested stakeholders are
very necessary for the smooth completion of a project and therefore the focus group can be
considered as an effective method which helps in the engagement of the important stakeholders
of the project and helps in seeking their inputs and knowledge to the fullest. Focus group helps in
providing with the quality information that an important project requires from its stakeholders
and this process will also help in making the stakeholders of the project feel that they are
important to the success of the project. According to Payán‐Sánchez et al. (2018) the stakeholder
focus group should involve the most important stakeholders of the project even if they are tough
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in their stance as by facilitating meetings in the group with the important stakeholders, the
success rate of the project increases. This method of stakeholder engagement is considered to be
most important and very effective in context with the current scenario as the various stakeholders
who are involved in the current project are all important in nature and therefore it is very
important to involve them and to seek their responses.
Questionnaires- Successful stakeholder engagement involves engaging with a wide range of
stakeholders and therefore methods such as surveys helps in getting involved with a large
number of stakeholders and to seek their responses and inputs. As stated by McDermott, Kurucz
and Colbert (2018) the survey can be conducted in the form of questionnaires and be conducted
over various medium such as the web, email, face to face or over the phone. There are various
available stakeholder survey designing guides, templates and survey building tools which are
available on the internet and it offers a variety of choices to the co-ordinator regarding selecting
the survey that will be appropriate for the project. The design of the questionnaire survey should
be done in such a way that it facilitates both open ended and close ended questions and also
ensure that they both use a combination of scoring and free text areas in order to obtain detailed
feedback from the stakeholders. This method of stakeholder engagement can be considered as
appropriate for the current project as it helps in bringing out the best responses and views from
the stakeholders who are unable to express their views in a detailed manner.
Stakeholder Interview- Stakeholder interview is an ideal method of engaging with stakeholders
which helps in fully understanding an issue and helps in drawing out a particular stakeholder
perspective which a project needs to focus upon in which interviews are conducted personally or
in group with the most influential stakeholders of a project. According to Cottrell et al. (2014)
the process of conducting stakeholder interviews offers great opportunity regarding gathering of
required and quality inputs from the stakeholders and helps in building rapport with the
stakeholders of the company which proves beneficial for the success of a project. The only
disadvantage which is associated with the stakeholder interview method is that is requires a
significant amount of time in conducting the interviews and therefore it is advisable that this
technique of stakeholder engagement is used in order to discuss the most important issues of a
project and in order to interact with the most important stakeholders of a project. This method of
stakeholder engagement is considered to be important for the company as this process helps is
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discussing and resolving important issues of the project with the important stakeholders of the
company so that an effective solution or consensus is reached between the expectations of the
stakeholders and the key deliverables of the project.
Newsletter and E-mails- Every project contains stakeholders or a group of stakeholders who can
be classified in the group of least important stakeholders and also all in to the category of show
considerations. These stakeholders or group of stakeholders are not very influential for the
project but can relatively damage to the success and future of a project if they are not involved in
the stakeholder engagement process or if their views and inputs are not valued considerably and
therefore it becomes a responsibility for the project co-ordinators too keep these stakeholders or
group of stakeholders important and therefore these stakeholders or group of stakeholders must
be kept informed through various means such as e-mails and newsletter as they have the
capability to reach a wide audience. Communicating to the stakeholders through newsletter and
e-mails helps in increasing the profile of a project and also helps in showcasing success of a
project. In case of communicating to the least important stakeholders it should be kept in mind
that it is very necessary to adjust the frequency of communication against the time available and
also keep in mind there are some audiences who will not read the content of the carefully crafted
e-mail and newsletter and therefore it is advised to try ‘pigging back’ on an existing publication
regarding a project in order to save time and resources and also to increase credibility in the
content of the newsletter and e-mail. This method of stakeholder engagement is effective in case
of this project as it will help in satisfying the least important stakeholders of the project within
the least possible time and resources and helps in focusing on engaging with the important
stakeholders of the project.
Websites and Podcasts- In context with the success and effectiveness of a project it is very
important that every project have a freely accessible shared area wherein information, important
dates, documents and news of a particular project can be stored and made available to the
stakeholders of a project. As stated by Vracheva, Judge and Madden (2016) a website or a
webpage of a project is an ideal location through which all the stakeholders of the project can be
communicated about the project and the most influential stakeholders of the project will be given
to certain privileged areas of the website or webpage in order to take part in online surveys or to
participate in online focus groups and the less important stakeholders of the project will be
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confined only to the news and development regarding a project. This process of stakeholder
engagement acts same as newsletter and e-mails in order to demonstrate success but the extra
addition in with this method of engagement is that it allows access to information to the
stakeholders of a project. In case of website the stakeholders can pull the information towards
them from the website whereas in case of newsletter and e-mails the information has to be
pushed towards them. This method of stakeholder engagement is very important in the context of
the project as this method helps in catering to the needs and demands of information of both the
important and less important stakeholders of the company in a single platform which helps in the
elimination of excess costs and time regarding the project.
As stated by Ryerson (2016) each of the above mentioned methods have several advantages and
disadvantages when it comes to engaging with the stakeholders and therefore it is recommended
to combine the above mentioned approaches and use a particular channel which the most
appropriate to the interest and influence of the stakeholders of the company. For instances the
stakeholders who fall in to the least important category can be engaged through open days or
through the website of the company and not including them in the focus group as it will be waste
of time and resources to include them in the focus group, but however the important groups
which are not particularly interested about the project may benefit from the involvement in
personal interviews and which might be the only way through which they can be drawn out.
Implementation Plan
The components of the implementation plan consist of the following elements:
Activities Timeline
Identification of the stakeholders of the project 1/10/2018- 5/10/2018
Analysing the stakeholders of the project 5/10/2018-7/10/2018
Mapping the stakeholders based on their
importance
7/10/2018-10/10/2018
Managing the stakeholders of the project based
on their importance and expectations
10/10/2018- 15/10/2018
Creating a focus group of the most important
stakeholders of the project
15/10/2018-17/10/2018
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