Robyn Welfare for Product Marketing Community

Speaker: Robyn Welfare, Research Director, DoubleCheck Research

Robyn Welfare: as a researcher, one of the biggest struggles that I hear and I've certainly experienced myself is the challenge of engaging stakeholders. So when I first started when lost research, I carefully planned a process and implemented a fabulous repository tool where we could store our data, centralize it and streamline it. Then I went to work and I conducted the actual research and the results were really interesting. I had really interesting observations and insights and I was excited to share this with my stakeholders. But there was just one problem. My stakeholders, they weren't engaged, they weren't excited and they definitely weren't feeling those aha moments I guess you could say I sort of felt like a skilled baseball player standing at the plate with great form and energy and as I took my swing, I was always striking out if this sounds familiar to you, I'd like to share three tips on how you can engage and support your stakeholders through a win loss program and hit a home run. So tip number one you know how your pictures pitch, don't wait until you've conducted your research and you have key findings before you reach out to your stakeholders, I would recommend reaching out to your stakeholders. Before you start your research, understand their curiosities, assumptions, what do they hope to learn from the program and why? By taking this first step, you're able to really tailor the program to ensure that the results will be meaningful to them and help them reach their goals. It's gonna get you program awareness and definitely buy in early on tip number two anticipate the curve balls, so engage with your stakeholders throughout the whole process of your research journey. Make sure they have a clear understanding of this project status and Sprinkle in some observations along the way as you're finding them as you're connecting them to data, be really considerate about how consistent you're being. Um what tool are you using and how often are you sharing this information? Another recommendation I have here is to be really collaborative in your approach, encourage conversation and comments and make sure you're recognizing those who are getting engaged. Not only will this increase your program awareness, but it's more importantly gonna help you understand where you may need to pivot to get those desired results And tip number three maximize the results as you bring it across the home plate. So as you're considering sharing this information, your key findings with your stakeholders, think about the delivery and how you're going to do, it makes you consider what it is they wanted to know. So those desired outcomes and also how do they like to consume information. So for example, do you have a stakeholder on your team who just loves to read the fine print and they live in the appendices section. We'll make sure you have them covered with all the data behind your sample size and your methodology but also don't forget the stakeholders who want a really clear and concise summary of your findings with an action that they can take to work and always provide the context, so share what you found, but why it matters and the impact it will have on the organization. I'd also suggest thinking about a story or a theme to connect to your data connected to a narrative and visuals, which will help it be more engaging. And also keep that content really sticky. So lastly, if there's one thing I've learned, it's that this process is really iterative. And Babe Ruth once said, never let the fear of striking out keep you from coming to bet. So keep at it, keep reviewing and improving your process. Make sure you solicit feedback regularly, collaborate and break down those silos. And before you know it you'll be hitting a ball right out of the park too.