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250 b. Conducting an assessment of stakeholders’ interests. Some interests increase the likelihood of achieving desired change. c. Assessment of stakeholders on what the stakeholders support and oppose in order to select those that form synergy with you. d. Assessing interest and point of view is not enough, a further assessment of stakeholder influence should be assessed. Only influencer stakeholders will make change happen. e. Lastly, some stakeholders are influential but not important. Hence, there is need to consider the importance of stakeholders too. UNICEF (2010) puts it this way: “although the stakeholders’ importance and their influence over an issue might seem similar, they are actually very different. The degree of influence reflects the direct power a stakeholder has to influence change. The importance on the other hand, reflects the necessity to engage that stakeholder in order to address the underlying causes of a problem and achieve sustainable change. Analysis of importance is very much consistent with a rights-based approach.” A mapping table can be created to aid the stakeholder and power analysis. Interest in the issue can be rated from low to high. Stakeholder’s point of view on the issues can be rated, for instance, as strong ally, medium ally, strong opponent etc. for stakeholders influence, influence can be rated as unknown, no influence, some influence moderate influence, significant influence and or very influential. Lastly, level of importance of the stakeholder can be rated as unknown , no importance , and some importance, moderate or very important . Rating must be done with partners to ensure correctness of ratings, therefore maximising likelihood of impact. Step 4: Mobilizing Support - Influencers are often used as partners in advocacy; to enhance support and influence the advocacy. Identifying partners can easily be from the audience analysis. Only partners that can bring added advantage and value to the advocacy should be involved. Numbers are not always important. However, the more partners come on board the better because this creates strong commitment and fosters coalition-building and social mobilisation based on common goals (WHO, 2008). Mobilising partners should be done with care. Adhering to the following guiding questions of mobilising partners can be helpful (UNICEF, 2010): a. Can they influence our target audience? b. Do we have shared interests and goals? Focus Box 5: Power of Working in Groups You can do what I cannot do. I can do what you cannot do. Together we ca do great things – Mother Teresa