Stakeholder

What is a stakeholder?

A stakeholder is a person, group or organization that has interest or concern in a project or area.

Stakeholders can affect or can be affected by the project's actions, objectives and policies. Some examples of key stakeholders are municipal and other authorities, companies, project developers, the water board and the community in an area. Not all stakeholders are equal; the municipality is usually in charge of livability in an area, which is often no concern for a project developer or waterboard.

An example of impact on stakeholders in an area is when a company needs to cut costs and plans a round of layoffs. This negatively affects the community of workers, the inhabitants in the area, and therefore the local economy. A project developer that plans a large commercial building may run into objections from the inhabitants as they are concerned about the lack of parking areas in their neighborhood. The municipality may require heat stress compensation in the plans, and the water board would like to see such a large concrete structure to better cope with excess rainfall to avoid any flooding.

How do stakeholders relate to the Tygron Engine?

The Tygron Engine streamlines the planning process by bringing the actual stakeholder roles from the real world into our multiplayer gaming environment. Users can then select which role they want to play, in order to experiment, plan and negotiate better solutions for spatial planning, urban designs and development projects. Users can select the role they fulfill in real life, or select any of the other available stakeholders to learn about the 'other side's' interests and concerns.

In the Tygron engine, the stakeholder’s interests and concerns are reflected in the indicators. With actions a stakeholder can affect the indicators and thus the game's outcome in a total score.

Different stakeholders have different interests and concerns

As mentioned above, different stakeholders have different interests (indicators) and concerns (importance). In the Tygron Engine each stakeholder is defined by it's indicators, importance and available actions. A Project Developer will prioritize it's profit margin, while a Housing Corporation will focus on reaching it's housing target and will be less (or not at all) focused on making any profit. Some stakeholders have a large budget but lack (ownership of) property to perform their actions on, others have the tools (actions) and property but lack the financial means to fulfill their objectives. By negotiating with each other, stakeholders are to search for any common grounds, in order to fulfill their individual and collective targets of the game.

Playable vs. Non playable

The Tygron Engine has Playable and Non playable stakeholders.

Playable stakeholders are stakeholders with a large influence sphere in the issues discussed in the area. Examples of players who have a large influence are the municipality which can accept or decline permits and the project developer who can realize new apartments.

Non playable stakeholders also have their role. They can be non playable because their impact on the issues in the area is minimal, or they are only marginally involved/ concerned. Inhabitants for example are often a non-playable stakeholder, since there's little they can do to really influence the issues (besides protesting and sending messages off course). Those non playable stakeholders can still be of value to the game. Those can be represented by a game facilitator during a game session. The facilitator can use those non playable stakeholders to send messages, in this way representing those parties and making their voice heard. The facilitator can also use those non playable stakeholders to send messages. If players are focusing too much on a certain subject and not addressing others they could be sent a message from the government for example.

Which types of stakeholder are available in the Tygron Engine?

Predefined stakeholders are available in the Tygron Engine, however, not all of these stakeholders have to be present and not all have to be playable either. As described above, stakeholders can be present in the 3D World without actually being playable. These non-playable Stakeholders can be represented by a game facilitator during a session.

The following predefined stakeholders are available for users to add to their game:

Civilian

These are the inhabitants of the 3D World. As individual they have a limited impact and concern, however, to have a project carried from the bottom up, participation from the inhabitants is essential.

Company

This private entity has a profit objective, and is also growing and expanding its market.

Education

Educational organizations can have a huge impact on the 3D World, with, for example, a rising demand for Student Housing and the impact on Quality of Life.

Expert

Sometimes expert advise and participation is required to resolve a complex spatial planning challenge.

Farmer

Farms usually occupy a large area and they also have a big impact on their surroundings.

Healthcare

Hospitals and clinics have a direct impact on their surroundings; they are usually big employers and have a huge demand for special supplies.

Housing Corporation

Being responsible for enough housing units in the 3D World, the housing corporation plays a big role in spatial planning.

Municipality

The municipality is the stakeholder with the main responsibility for zoning and approval of building permits. They are also in charge of the livability in the 3D World and management of the public spaces, including sewers and roads.

Media

Newspapers and other media play a big part in communicating plans to other playable and non playable stakeholders.

Project Developer

The Project Developer has to make profit by building commercial constructions, such as shops and industry.

Waterboard

This semi governmental body is responsible for water management in the 3D World. Usually the waterboard has no property in ownership and needs to negotiate with other stakeholders to be able to perform any actions.

Other Authority

Sometimes a provincial or national/ federal (or even international) body of authority is also active in the 3D World.

Other

In case a specific unlisted stakeholder is required, this option can be customized.

Accessing stakeholder properties in the Tygron Engine?

The stakeholders available in the Tygron Engine all have a set of properties that can be adjusted. All the properties that can be adjusted for stakeholders can be found on the Stakeholder tab in the Tygron Engine Editor.

File:Editor stakeholders tab.jpg

Left Panel: Available Stakeholders. Right Panel: Selected Stakeholder properties.

Left Panel: Select a stakeholder for adjustment

From within the Left Panel a stakeholder can be selected. The options to add, remove or duplicate a stakeholder are available on the bottom of the Left Panel.

File:Editor stakeholders tab add.jpg

Adding, removing and duplicating a stakeholder

Selecting a stakeholder makes its properties adjustable in the Right Panel.

File:Editor stakeholders tab right panel.jpg

Stakeholder properties

Right Panel: Stakeholder Properties

Stakeholder properties

Name

Each stakeholder has a name in order to differentiate between the different stakeholders. In this field the full name of a stakeholder can be entered.

Short Name

When a stakeholder's name is very long, a short version can be entered here, which will be used in instances in game with limited space. This occurs in places such as the top bar and in drop down lists.

Type

There are different types (See also) of stakeholders available in the Tygron Engine. In this field the type of stakeholder can be changed by selecting an option from the drop down menu.

Image

Each stakeholder has an image or icon assigned to it for better identification in game. These images are used on the stakeholder summary on the top bar and in messages. By clicking on the image on the stakeholder panel, a second panel will open from where another image for the stakeholder can be selected. This can be a generic image or users can add custom assets - such as a company's logo - to their game, as long as the image (.png/.jpg) adheres to the size requirement of 100x100 pixels.

Color

The color is used besides the name to differentiate between different stakeholders present in game. The selected color will indicate the stakeholder's property on the ownership overlay. By clicking and holding the left mouse button on this field, another color can be selected from a context menu.

Playable

Selected stakeholders can be made playable, which means that players can select the stakeholder and play the game in that role. This selection box marks if the stakeholder can be selected for play or not. Non playable stakeholders can be represented by a game facilitator. See also: Playable vs. Non playable

Description

The description text informs a player about the Stakeholder. In this field the introduction text can be entered for the selected stakeholder. This text is then displayed as introduction at the start of a game session, when a player highlights the stakeholder.

Draw Ownership

Ownership of property is an important aspect in the Tygron Engine. By selecting this option, the area of ownership of property of the stakeholder can be drawn into the 3D World using the selected color.

Left Panel: Stakeholders: Levels Info

Stakeholder properties

Level

The name of the selected level is displayed here.

Additional Budget gained in this Level

Stakeholders are assigned a budget to be able to perform any actions. On the 'Level 1' tab the option is available to give a stakeholder a starting budget. Please enter the amount as starting budget. The budget can be incremented each level.

Assignment for this level

The assignment describes in text the assignment of the selected stakeholder for the selected level. All players will be given a specific assignment related to the indicators and importance. The assignment for the current level can be accessed by the stakeholders by clicking the "Progress" panel.

Stakeholder Indicators & Indicator Weights

To link stakeholders with indicators, indicators can be added to and removed from stakeholders. Specific indicators can be activated or deactivated for the selected stakeholder per level. In the table below the "Indicator Weights" the indicators which are active for the selected Level are displayed. The "Name" corresponds to an indicator name, the "Value" corresponds to the importance which a stakeholder attaches to a certain indicator. Higher means more importance. The second column of the indicator weights table enables adjusting the importance of the selected indicator. The Indicator weight is the weight the indicator has on the total score.

Editing Stakeholders

In case the video is not working from the Internal Browser, use the link below to copy and paste it to a new browser window.

Stakeholder Tutorial on YouTube