To read this content please select one of the options below:

Co-design of a stakeholders’ ecosystem: an assessment methodology by linking social network analysis, stakeholder theory and participatory mapping

Dario Cottafava (Department of Physics, University of Turin, Turin, Italy)
Laura Corazza (Department of Management, University of Turin, Turin, Italy)

Kybernetes

ISSN: 0368-492X

Article publication date: 5 November 2020

Issue publication date: 27 March 2021

649

Abstract

Purpose

The need for stakeholder theory has been widely highlighted in the literature to develop solid strategies for a large organization. However, there is still a lack of user-friendly visualization tools and no unique approach exists to identify and engage stakeholders. This paper aims to propose a general methodology to co-design the sustainability ecosystem at the local scale, to explore it and to assess the impact of a large organization within the identified ecosystem.

Design/methodology/approach

The methodology consists of two main processes: identifying an ontological map of the sustainability topics network and designing the local sustainability stakeholders ecosystem. Both processes are based on a nodes identification phase and a nodes prioritization phase. The identification phase was achieved by engaging 160 citizens, for the topics network and nearly 40 relevant stakeholders, for the stakeholders’ ecosystem, with a collaborative participatory mapping process. The prioritization phase was conducted because of three indicators, i.e. the closeness, the betweenness and the eigenvector centrality.

Findings

Betweenness centrality results to be the best indicator to assess the importance of a stakeholder with respect to the whole network, while eigenvector centrality highlights the quality of the already engaged stakeholders of an organization, as it mainly depends on the number of links of the first order neighbors. On the contrary, the closeness centrality, when applied to a small network, seems to be not appropriate to assess the centrality of a stakeholder.

Research limitations/implications

This approach revealed some criticalities in the mapping process, as in the weighting link procedure. Further investigations are needed to generalize the approach to a dynamic one, to allow real-time mapping and to develop a robust interconnection among centrality degrees and the power, interest and legitimacy concept of stakeholder theory.

Practical implications

Obtained results for a case study, i.e. the position of the University of Turin Green Office within the City of Turin sustainability ecosystem, are discussed showing how social network analysis centrality degrees can be used to quantitatively assess the role of an organization within a stakeholders’ ecosystem.

Social implications

Centrality analysis allows identifying emergent topics/stakeholders within a network of words/actors that, at a first sight, should not be considered by decision-makers and managers.

Originality/value

A new methodology for stakeholder identification and prioritization is proposed exploiting online data visualization tools, participatory mapping and social network analysis.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the City of Turin which hosted and promoted the workshop “co-design of the sustainability ecosystem” within the framework “Torino. Design of the City” and Germano Paini for the invitation. They also thanks to the Green Office of the University of Turin, and to Egidio Dansero to support the initiative and the relevant stakeholder engagement process. They thank to Alessandro Sciullo as well, who gave very helpful and inspiring insights on the methodology and helped them to organize and facilitate the workshop.

Citation

Cottafava, D. and Corazza, L. (2021), "Co-design of a stakeholders’ ecosystem: an assessment methodology by linking social network analysis, stakeholder theory and participatory mapping", Kybernetes, Vol. 50 No. 3, pp. 836-858. https://doi.org/10.1108/K-12-2019-0861

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2020, Emerald Publishing Limited

Related articles