Stakeholders and Change · tool 4 of 8
Working With Your Sponsor
Working With Your Sponsor: keeps the most important person on the project active and useful.
Best for: Throughout · Time: 30 min a fortnight
Domain: Stakeholders · Focus area: Executing
How it works
Sponsors secure money, clear blockers and take decisions you can’t. Yet many are busy and only half engaged. Your job is to make helping you easy, with short, specific requests.
- Agree how you’ll work together early.
- Bring decisions with a recommendation.
- Never let them be surprised.
How to apply it
- Ask what success means to them personally.
- Agree a rhythm and format.
- Give bad news early, with options.
- Ask for one specific action.
In practice
“I need you to call the head of IT by Friday, or testing slips two weeks.”
Pro tip
Give your sponsor something specific to do. Vague updates get vague support.
Use it
- Playbook: Our sponsor has left
Quick check
How should bad news reach a sponsor?
Sources
- PMBOK® Guide, 8th edition, and The Standard for Project Management (PMI, 2025)
- J. Hiatt, ADKAR: A Model for Change (Prosci, 2006) (Prosci on ADKAR with PRINCE2)
Last reviewed 2026-11-02 against the PMBOK® Guide, 8th edition · Practitioner review pending · How this guide is made