How to speed up the stakeholder approval process

Sponsors rarely sit on an approval out of carelessness, whether they run the business unit funding an internal program or sign off for a client. The request usually makes answering harder than it needs to be, so it drops below everything else in their week. Look at the last approval that took more than a few days and you will usually find one or more of these:

• It was buried. The question sat inside a long update, after the news, so the sponsor read it as information rather than a request.
• It was open-ended. “Thoughts?” invites an essay, and essays wait for a free afternoon.
• It had no date. Without a deadline, the request competes with everything that has one, and loses.
• It needed setup. A login, a download, or a tool the sponsor doesn’t use adds a step most people postpone.
• Too many people had to agree. Every extra approver adds a queue and another opinion.
• Nobody said what waiting costs. If a week’s delay moves the launch, the sponsor should hear that while the week can still be saved.

A good approval request can be answered by someone who reads only that message, on a phone, between two meetings. Build it in this order.

1. 1Name the decision in one sentence“Which homepage headline should we launch with?” beats “Some thoughts on the homepage.” If you can’t write the sentence, the decision isn’t ready to send.
2. 2Offer two or three optionsWrite each option so it could be picked as is. Two is ideal for a yes or no in disguise; three gives room for a middle path. More than three turns a decision back into a review.
3. 3Mark your recommendation and say why in one lineYou are closer to the work. Saying which option you would pick, and the single reason, lets a busy sponsor agree with confidence instead of researching from scratch.
4. 4Give a date and the cost of waiting“Needed by Thursday. Each day after that moves launch by a day.” Put the cost in their terms: the launch date, the campaign window, the budget line. It turns a nice-to-answer into a must-answer without any pressure in your tone.
5. 5Attach only what the decision needsOne link to the version being approved, not the folder. If the sponsor needs background, give it in two sentences under the options.

Once the request is clear, remove every step between reading it and answering it. Send it to the channel the approver already reads, which for most executives is email on a phone. Let them answer by tapping an option or replying with a letter. If they have to sign in somewhere first, expect a share of requests to wait until they are back at a desk.

Keep reviews and decisions apart. Markup on a design, comments in a document, and a decision about which direction to take are different jobs. Ask for the decision on its own, and point to where detailed comments go if they have any.

The kickoff is the cheapest moment to speed up every later approval. Agree three things and write them into the project plan.

• Who approves what. Name one person per type of decision, and a second person if the first is away.
• How long they have. A window the sponsor agrees to, such as two working days for routine items and a week for anything that needs their own internal sign-off.
• What happens on silence. Some agencies write a deemed-approval clause into the contract. If you use one, agree it openly and mention it in the request when it applies, so it never feels like a trap.

Chasing feels awkward because it usually happens late and emotionally. Decide the schedule up front instead: a reminder a few days after asking, one the day before the deadline, and then a named next step, such as a call or passing the question to the second approver. A schedule the sponsor already knows reads as process.

Each reminder should restate the question and the options in full, so the sponsor never has to scroll back to find them. If something has changed since you asked, say so in one line at the top.

The fastest approval is the one you didn’t need. Agree ranges that don’t need sign-off, like copy edits that don’t change meaning, or any change under a set number of hours. Group small, related questions into one decision with clear options. Reserve the sponsor’s attention for choices that change cost, scope, timing, or how the work will be judged.

Keep one list of open requests with the date each was sent. Review it in your weekly check-in. The total days spent waiting on approvals is usually the clearest explanation for a slipping date, and it gives you something factual to raise at the steering meeting instead of a feeling that approvals are slow.

Unblockd is built around this kind of request. An ask carries the question, the options, your recommendation, the date, and the cost of waiting. The sponsor answers from the email or a private page without an account, a reminder goes out after 3 days and again before the deadline, and every open ask shows how long it has waited. See sponsor approvals for how it works.