By Immanuel BOAMA-WIAFE & Delphina NYEMITEI
Imagine this: a critical system fails. Alarms blare. Customers flood the support lines. Leadership demands an immediate restoration ETA. Everyone scrambles, driven by instinct rather than structure, only to discover that the official Disaster Recovery (DR) plan — the one proudly filed away for compliance — is nothing more than a binder collecting dust. The recovery is chaotic, costly, and leaves the organization shaken and vulnerable.
Sadly, this isn’t an uncommon story. It’s the quiet, recurring truth behind countless organizations. We treat Disaster Recovery (DR) and Business Continuity Planning (BCP) as procedural exercises — checklists designed to meet audit requirements — rather than as living systems that reflect how our organizations think, communicate, and adapt under pressure. Yet true resilience isn’t born from documentation; it’s cultivated through a disciplined, ongoing process of alignment, communication, and culture.
During a recent BCP/DR review, this reality became painfully clear. What began as a structured mission to standardize our response soon uncovered something deeper: the greatest threats to recovery weren’t the disasters themselves, but the unseen organizational fractures that surfaced along the way.
Most BCP/DR initiatives don’t fail when a crisis strikes — they fail long before that, quietly, through a series of small disconnects between intention and execution. Not from lack of effort, but from a misunderstanding of what real resilience demands.
Our project began with the best intentions — to enhance preparedness, reduce downtime, and build a culture of readiness. But soon, we found ourselves navigating challenges that mirrored the very dysfunctions we were trying to prevent. The lessons that emerged were not about servers, systems, or technology. They were about leadership clarity, communication discipline, and cultural alignment — the three human dimensions that either anchor or derail every major initiative.
The stakeholder buy-in problem
The first and most fundamental issue was leadership without boundaries. The project was launched without a clearly defined, top-down mandate. There was enthusiasm, but no shared understanding of scope, success criteria, or finish line. Each department interpreted the mission through its own lens. Some over-engineered, others disengaged.
The absence of a strategic anchor at the executive level created a ripple effect of confusion and inefficiency. It became clear that without leadership setting — and visibly owning — the direction, even the most technically sound initiatives lose focus. Then came the crisis of communication. We managed the project plan meticulously but neglected the narrative. The “why” behind the initiative — the purpose that should have united everyone — was never consistently communicated.
To some, the BCP/DR effort was a strategic imperative to safeguard the business. To others, it was just another compliance checkbox or, worse, a fault-finding exercise. The result was skepticism, fatigue, and quiet resistance. It was a sobering reminder that project success is not won through task completion alone, but through the consistent reinforcement of meaning and intent.
Finally, there was the cultural challenge — the human firewall of inertia. The quiet murmur across teams was that this would become another “white elephant” project. The resistance wasn’t to the idea of continuity itself, but to the discomfort of change. We had prepared for the disaster in the data center but not the one in the cafeteria. The real failure was not in the technical design but in the absence of structured change management — the art of guiding, educating, and reassuring people through transformation.
What became evident through this experience is that the success or failure of any major project, whether it’s a BCP initiative or a technology transformation, is not determined by the robustness of the framework or the sophistication of the tools. It hinges on how intentionally stakeholders are engaged, aligned, and sustained throughout the journey.
Positioning stakeholders at the center of project success
Stakeholder intentionality is not a soft skill — it is the central nervous system of project management. Intentional stakeholder management ensures clarity at every level — from executives who define purpose, to functional leads who drive execution, to end users who live the change daily. It transforms projects from mechanical exercises into shared missions.
When stakeholders understand their roles, feel heard, and see their input reflected in the process, they become active contributors rather than passive observers. This alignment builds ownership, and ownership is what sustains momentum when challenges arise. Projects fail not because plans are poor, but because people lose connection to the “why.” To build true resilience, organizations must first commit to structure, clarity, and engagement.
A strong starting point is a Project Charter endorsed by executive sponsors that defines the project’s objectives, deliverables, boundaries, and exclusions. This single document can dramatically reduce scope creep by setting a clear baseline for what success looks like. Beyond documentation, it also serves as a public commitment — a signal that leadership is invested, visible, and accountable. Complementing this is robust governance.
A Steering Committee that includes both executive and functional leaders ensures that decisions are made with context and authority. It creates a channel for escalation, alignment, and continuity. Within the delivery structure, tools like a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) and a RACI matrix help translate strategy into action. They bring clarity to ownership, reveal dependencies, and enable prioritization — ensuring that the project moves forward with rhythm and discipline. However, governance and structure are only half the equation.
The other half — and arguably the more important one — is communication. A stakeholder analysis at the outset helps identify who matters most, who influences adoption, and how best to reach them. By mapping stakeholder influence and interest, project teams can design communication that resonates — targeted updates for executives, scenario simulations for operational teams, and interactive workshops for end users.
A structured communication plan with a defined cadence builds consistency and trust. Whether it’s through newsletters, dashboards, or town halls, the goal is to ensure that every stakeholder receives the right information, in the right tone, at the right time. Transparency is crucial. A simple color-coded project dashboard can do more for cross-departmental understanding than pages of reports — because clarity drives confidence.
Finally, no amount of process can overcome cultural inertia without intentional effort. The ADKAR model — focusing on Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability, and Reinforcement — provides a practical roadmap for change. Paired with role-based training and departmental “change champions,” it helps translate policy into behaviour. And when organizations recognize and celebrate teams that demonstrate preparedness excellence, resilience stops being a compliance burden and becomes a cultural badge of honour.
The most successful programs combine strong project management discipline with human-centred leadership. They secure executive sponsorship early, invest in change management from day one, define clear success metrics, and create open feedback loops. They see resilience as an evolving capability, not a one-time goal, recognising that people are central to every project.
Conclusion
Processes give structure, but stakeholder management gives life. The heart of successful project management — and of true resilience — lies in our ability to engage intentionally, communicate purposefully, and lead empathetically. True project management isn’t about managing tasks; it’s about managing trust. It’s about ensuring that every stakeholder understands the mission, sees their role in it, and feels part of the outcome. When organizations operate with that level of intentionality, they don’t just deliver projects — they build cultures that can weather any storm. Resilience, after all, isn’t something you document. It’s something you live.
>>>Immanuel Boama-Wiafe is a Cybersecurity Transformation Lead and GRC professional. He specializes in helping organizations strengthen cyber resilience through standards-based auditing, risk management, and digital assurance.
>>>Delphina Nyemitei is an HR Project Manager. She leads high impact initiatives using Agile and Scrum methodology to drive project delivery across diverse sectors, with strong expertise in stakeholder management and technology adaptability.
