How Gap Inc. Engaged with its stakeholders

While Gap Inc. was once the target of global protests, the company has since cultivated close relationships with stakeholders such as labor groups, human rights organizations and governments. Back when protesters were targeting the company, the Gap realized that it needed to overhaul the way it interacted with its critics. So the company launched a strategy of stakeholder engagement. Stakeholder engagement is not easy; the process is often expensive and slow. Identifying and prioritizing stake-holders can enable a company to focus on developing relationships with a few key stakeholder organizations. Gap's stakeholder engagement strategy transformed the way Gap approached inevitable ethical trading problems. However, the change did not happen overnight. Instead, management learned a number of key lessons over time. In this article, based on in-depth interviews conducted in 2009 with Gap management and key external stakeholder representatives, we describe how Gap developed its stakeholder engagement strategy, the work such a shift entails and the many ways in which stakeholder engagement has benefited the company.