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Working Better Together as Team Europe Through joint programming and joint implementation Guidance
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Section 4: Communications and visibility

Working Better Together as Team Europe
Through joint programming and joint implementation

Guidance

A tool to help EU Delegations work better together with Member States as Team Europe and with like-minded partners and country stakeholders, through joint programming and implementation.

 

 

Communications and visibility

Successfully communicating with one voice and with an identifiable ‘Team Europe’ brand at country level requires a coordinated, strategic approach to communication before, during and after the programming process of the EU and its Member States that focuses on articulating coherent and common priorities and messages.

 

Effective communication of joint objectives and results achieved as Team Europe will help to engage partners, build consensus and demonstrate accountability, while managing expectations. Communications will also help to unlock the potential of joint programming to increase European visibility, providing the EU and MS, as Team Europe, with a platform for greater policy influence. This focus on visibility can also support greater consistency between political dialogue and development cooperation.

Communication on Team Europe should contribute to a broader and reinforced country communication strategy in partner countries, which delegations will need to develop as NDICI-Global Europe is rolled out during 2021-2022. The objective will be to bring together the political, policy and financial angles to strengthen our impact on the ground, both politically and in communication terms, creating a strong political narrative around “What does Europe stand for” / ”Europe’s offer to the country”. More detail on this will follow as part of an upcoming Team Europe Communications Strategy.

A key part of the joint communication on Team Europe is the introduction of the Team Europe visual identity. It has been disseminated to all Team Europe members to enable EU Member States, EU institutions and partners to use consistent visual language when communicating about joint activities under the Team Europe approach, such as the Team Europe Initiatives.

 

Improving visibility as part of working better together initiatives

The joint programming process can sometimes be largely viewed as technical and process-driven, rather than being deeply political in nature. It may therefore prove challenging to identify activities that can be commu- nicated to a large audience in accessible language. For countries with an active joint programming process, there are good practices adopted by different European groups that can be shared, as well as easy to mobilise resources (human and technical) at headquarters.

A key aim of Team Europe communication is to shift from what Europe is doing to what Europe stands for, calling attention to European values. This will rely on close coordination not just across Team Europe members, but within as well, joining forces across development cooperation and political sections and involving Heads of Missions. Consider also communicating on aspects such as how Team Europe supports the partner country in achieving development objectives, such as the SDGs as well as the total amount of European funds invested.

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GHANA

 

In Ghana, the joint programming document contains a specific section on joint visibility and communication. The joint visibility strategy identified joint written publications, organised joint events, such as joint signing ceremonies for projects and programmes, joint missions and joint reporting, and cross-references on individual participating partners’ websites as some of the key activities to support joint visibility.

 

Possible activities

  • Consult and organise meetings with participating partners’ communications officers on how best to use the joint programming exercise or Team Europe initiative formulation to improve the visibility of Team Europe.
  • Map out a calendar of key events in the partner country or in relation to the participating partners and develop joint press releases. This can improve the likelihood of press releases appearing in the local press.
  • Brief Heads of Mission and political officers properly so that they can refer to Team Europe and joint programming when interviewed or speaking at official events: a tagline such as ‘European partners working together’ could be considered
  • Develop a user-friendly brochure explaining the key goals of Team Europe working together in the par- tner country:
    • For example, employ an easily understood metaphor such as working together as a sports team.
    • Explain how joint programming adds value. Quote combined financial allocations, preferably in local cur- rency and converted to round numbers, compared to the partner government’s budget.
    • Explicitly name participating partners and include their flags/logos.
    • Provide an explanation as to what objectively verifiable results are being pursued in priority sectors.
    • Resist using joint programming jargon, i.e. technocratic expressions or narratives such as fragmentation, harmonisation, and programming, as these will mean little to the public.
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LAOS

In Laos, the European group (EU, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland and the Luxembourg) and two like-minded partners (Switzerland and the UK) produced a brochure that outlines how Europeans contribute to the achievement of the SDGs in Laos.
The European partners have jointly identified seven priority sectors in which they have a comparative advantage and are active in policy dialogue. The sectors are aligned with the government of Lao PDR’s policies and definitions. Coordination is ensured through the relevant working group mechanism, thus enabling ownership. European partners are harmonising their programming through this joint programming exercise, with each sector contributing to a results framework linked to monitoring indicators that enable mutual accountability for results.

 

  • Once finalised, consider giving the joint programming document the Team Europe ‘official look’ and brand so as to ensure it is appropriate for public circulation (good examples include the monitoring report on joint Programming for Cambodia and brochures produced in Palestine and Laos). Translating into local languages can also trigger a wider circulation among the target audience.
  • Explore new ways of communicating joint programming messages, such as social media, short videos, infographics and local events (see below: infographics produced per country based on 2018 OECD DAC data).
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  • Consider hosting joint visibility events in priority areas for the joint programming document and using these sector entry points to communicate on the radio, TV and/or the press, reporting on the collective work of the European partners.
  • Agree locally that any speeches by participating partners on specific projects should refer to the project’s impact on a priority in the joint programming document and how they complement the Team Europe Initiative(s) in-country.
  • Produce visibility items in partnership with press and information officers that make reference to Team Europe and the joint programming document, such as a banner or t-shirts for events. Flags of participating partners are usually a good way to provide visibility to all participating partners and communicate the ‘joint’ aspect – consider using the Team Europe visual identity.
  • Consider undertaking joint missions with the press to visit a range of participating partners’ projects (including joint implementation) to reinforce the joint nature of their work and provide human stories linked to the European priorities.
  • Consider publishing a Blue Book that captures the contributions of participating partners under the joint programming document or specific instances of joint implementation (a good example is the Kenya Blue Book 2016).

Materials available

The following video about joint implementation is based on interviews conducted at the Global Learning Event on Joint Programming in Kampala, Uganda (19-21 November 2019).

There is a substantial capacity building effort at HQ to create a ‘bank of knowledge’ around joint programming and joint implementation. The main repository platform for communication materials is DIVA Platform, open to both the EU and to Member States officials. Other key sources for gathering evidence are the open-access, public Joint Programming tracker and the joint programming and joint implementation group that offers a repository of documents and frequent updates about country cases to registered members. In addition, there is an online course offered to EU and non-EU staff via the ‘Intpa Academy’ website.

The Team Europe Visual Identity guide and templates are accessible on the INTPA intranet, EC Social Media wiki or in the joint Programming and joint Implementation group on Capacity4Dev. A Team Europe Communications Strategy is under development.

An additional resource can be the updated ‘Communication and Visibility Requirements’ for implementing partners.

Please contact the INTPA joint programming team or visit the joint programming group at Capacity4dev for all communication support (for contacts see the Introduction, page 5).

 

Each section or chapter may be used separately to fulfil a specific need for guidance, which means there may be some overlap between the different parts of the document.

If you have any questions, you may contact the relevant helpdesk or functional mailbox: