Shandler Consulting helps organisations navigate complex stakeholder and conflict challenges with clarity, insight and confidence. We work with organisations to reduce risk and create lasting value.
Shandler Consulting works with organisations facing significant stakeholder and conflict challenges. We help them develop a deep understanding of the dynamics at play, positions them to manage their risks and guides their responses to both retain and build value.
While these challenges often centre on the relationship between stakeholders and the organisation, they are frequently internal as well, including staffing, skills, systems and culture. We help organisations work through these difficulties using structured methods and techniques, turning points of friction into opportunities for growth.
Experience in all aspects of conflict management, including analysis, strategy, mediation, dispute settlement and capacity development across government, business and community sectors.
Support the building of sustainable stakeholder relationships through analysing, strategising, planning and implementing creative action in complex multi-party environments.
Skilled facilitation in organisations and multi-stakeholder environments, including high-level decision-making, technical dialogue and community engagement across antagonistic relationships.
Design and delivery of training for leaders and operational staff in face-to-face and online settings, embedding practical engagement and conflict management skills, drawing on case examples from participants' own contexts.
Analysis and planning for projects with developmental, socio-economic and political dimensions, including social impact assessment and resettlement planning.
A global mining company needed consistent conflict management guidance across its operations. We developed standardised guidance by integrating established conflict analysis frameworks with years of practitioner experience. The guidance aligned with the company's existing performance standards to enable adoption across all business units. The company gained practical guidance material that built internal capability.
A commodity mining operation faced mounting pressure from multiple interest groups in its local community, including blockades and protests. Working with mine personnel and external stakeholders, we developed a conflict management plan addressing existing and potential conflict issues, relationships and business needs. The plan set out engagement actions, dispute resolution mechanisms and capacity-building measures. The operation gained clarity on how to address the conflicts, and identified internal staffing and systems that required strengthening.
A national port faced community resistance to expansion driven by growth in shipping demand. We established a structured engagement process bringing local government, business, labour, community environmental organisations into substantive dialogue. The process created space to address concerns and identify solutions. The port secured the necessary environmental authorisations and moved forward with expansion.
An early-stage mine development faced diverse stakeholder concerns that posed mission-critical challenges to the proposed operation. We undertook a full conflict and stakeholder analysis, mapping the actors, their stated positions, and their underlying interests, as well as a structured assessment of internal capacity to manage conflict. The resulting response approach set out a sequenced path to manage the escalated conflicts, along with internal capacity development measures and ongoing focused engagement. The company gained a strategy to prevent further escalation and build the internal capabilities needed to navigate the engagement.
An internet cable developer and the offshore trawling industry were at an impasse over a data connectivity project that covered the full extent of the west African coastline. We conducted a mediation process that brought both parties together to explore technical issues and identify operational alternatives. The mediation resulted in an agreement allowing both to proceed without significant disruption.
Key staff in a dispersed multinational mining company lacked a common understanding of the causes and drivers of conflict and the measures needed to respond across operations. We designed and delivered training targeting leaders and operational staff, incorporating case examples from participants' own contexts. Participants gained practical skills, increased confidence in addressing conflicts, and guidance on how to deal with pressing current issues.
An industrial port town with large-scale polluting industries adjacent to a natural heritage lagoon faced environmental management challenges and disputes. We facilitated the establishment of a multi-stakeholder forum, developing a founding document that set out a vision and operating rules. The forum was established as an independent body capable of managing its own operations and driving collaborative environmental stewardship.
An international oil and gas company new to East Africa lacked experience managing complex stakeholder engagement in a new operating environment. Working with country and global leadership, we assessed engagement needs, mapped the stakeholder environment and developed a comprehensive engagement strategy with detailed implementation plan. The company gained practical guidance material that informed engagement actions across the country.
Shandler Consulting has created the Conflict Intelligence Platform for clients seeking a user-controlled, AI-supported tool to help them analyse, prevent and respond to social and external stakeholder conflict. It is designed to provide quick and efficient responses to complex challenges.
Draws on user-provided source material to identify and examine conflicts, parties, causes and trends.
Assesses an organisation's staff, skills, systems and culture around conflict management.
Develops high-level strategy and detailed implementation plans for existing and emerging conflicts.
Offers practical advice for navigating each implementation challenge as it arises.
The Platform operates offline by default, keeping analysis grounded in verified source material. It is currently in beta. Shandler Consulting works directly with organisations to deploy it and shape outputs to each client's requirements.
David has decades of experience working with organisational leaders and managers in the public, private, multilateral and civil society sectors across diverse industries including mining, energy, infrastructure natural resource management. He has worked across Africa, Europe, the Americas and Asia on major projects with complex stakeholder challenges.
He founded Shandler Consulting to bring a structured, methodology-driven approach to conflict management and stakeholder engagement. His work spans direct advisory, delivery and the development of frameworks and tools that support it, including facilitation of strategic and operational planning processes for clients navigating complex multi-party challenges.
Please contact us to discuss how Shandler Consulting can help you navigate stakeholder and conflict challenges.