This role requires subject-matter expertise in the domain or the interest area.

In some project cultures, a person playing the Stakeholder role must act as the representative for a number of other disenfranchised people: people who will be materially affected by the outcome of the project, but cannot for some reason represent their needs directly. As such, the assigned Stakeholder representative must be able to elicit sufficient information from other members of the interest group to fairly represent their needs.

This role can be assigned in the following ways:

• Assign one or more staff members to perform this role only. This works well in large teams, where there are a sufficient number of subject-matter experts available who have significant domain knowledge that is critical to the success of the project.
• Assign one or more staff members to perform both this role and Role: System Analyst or Role: Requirements Specifier. This strategy is a good option for small to mid-sized test teams, and is often used where domain experts are available to play both roles. You need to be careful that appropriate effort is devoted to satisfying both of these roles, and that the domain expert is suitable skilled in requirements elicitation and communication.
• Assign one or more staff members to perform both this role and Role: Test Analyst or Role: Tester roles. This strategy is another option for small to mid-sized test teams, and is often used where domain experts are available to play both roles. Again, you need to be careful that appropriate effort is devoted to satisfying both of these roles, and that enough training is provided in testing practices to make this approach viable.

If either of the latter approaches are taken, it is recommended that you make sure that at least some staff with specialized skills and experience are assigned primarily to the roles indicated as secondary here.