So I am a developer-turned-BA, and I have a question about scheduling meetings with stakeholders and other 'important' people : is the accepted practice to simply pick a time and day for a meeting that you THINK will work for everyone, schedule the meeting and then see what everyone says? OR, is it better to ask the primary people what days/times might work for them, and then given what they've told you, try to schedule based on that information?

Thanks for all advice and insight : )

Kevin

Absolutely -- call folks up and get that voice-to-voice conversation. 

If you get voicemail only, I'd recommend leaving a voicemail about what it is you're trying to do (stakeholder meeting to get xyz), what you want from this person (his/her availability during week xyz) and indicate you'll call back the next day.  If it's time-sensitive to set up a meeting, then you might want to follow up the voicemail with an email (and still call back if you don't hear within a day).  Until you build up the relationship with the stakeholder it'd likely be best not to send a direct calendar meeting.

If dealing with senior leadership (or someone who screens everything behind an admin), make sure that you firmly establish the person's availability with the admin.  If you'll be dealing with this stakeholder a lot, you could even consider the admin as a quasi-stakeholder ("Keeper of the Calendar" for the primary stakeholder).

Especially going in to the first few major stakeholder meetings, always a good idea to send out the agenda ahead of time (will help you get a grasp of the people involved).  Also, it's easy to forget... make sure you devote 5 minutes of setting expectations at the start of the meeting: describe who you are, what you're working on, what you're looking to get from the people (even if you've already gone through it on the phone with folks one-by-one).

-- Adam