I just finished a call with a cohort from The Good Lobby.
I learned a lot from Agnese Marcon and the excellent campaign work of the Eurogroup for Animal.
Below is a copy of the text I used. Maybe of use for some. I’ve removed the specific example of lessons learned in fish as I know interest in fisheries policy is low.
23 suggestions on how to better engage with policymakers.
- Know your audience. Use social network analysis to identify the key players. There are often no more than 200 people across the 27 member states. For the Commission, know people in the task force, the inter-service steering group (ISSG), and Inter-service consultation (Services and Cabinets).
- Be on time. If you miss the window of opportunity, you can hang around for the next five years, waiting for your issue to come up. The windows of opportunity are indicated, but most people don’t see them.
- Use the language of your audience.
- Know their rulebooks. For the Commission, that includes better regulation guidelines, political guidelines, mission letters, and specific rulebooks for procedures.
- Be able to switch your language up and down in terms of detail.
- For all meetings, you need to prepare, rehearse, record yourself, and enjoy the humiliation. Most people hate it, but it will increase your performance tenfold.
- Know that clear and persuasive writing and speaking are different skills. They are not necessarily in the same person.
- Chunk down information and don’t water board, officials or politicians.
- Many experts can’t communicate either in writing or in speaking beyond the given small clique. They need coaching. If they can’t be coached or refuse to be coached, don’t use them. They’ll harm you.
- If you have colleagues who think that insulting people works, keep them locked away.
- Be civil.
- As most decisions are made in written procedure, learn to write text that is clear, concise and understandable.
- Note the desk officer and the political adviser will often make many of the key operational and practical decisions so it’s useful not to piss them off.
- Bring objective data to the table. Note that to prepare this, you probably have to stay a year in advance. It’s not lying around. Recommend John W kingdom’s agenda, agendas, alternatives and public policy on finding the best window of opportunity. It’s useful to have the proposal, the draft impact assessment, and the supporting evidence sitting in your filing cabinet for when the window of opportunity comes about.
- The late Tony Long (WWF EPO founder) worked in partnership with industry allies. It helped a lot.
- Avoid internal meetings. They sap energy. Your ratio between internal meetings and meetings with decision-makers should be 50/50. In terms of campaigns, it should be 90/10.
- Work with the media. Find out what decision-makers and politicians read.
- It is vitally important that you learn how to tell a story. Most can’t.
- You need to bring real solutions to a table to the table with evidence.
- The challenge is to keep your emotions intact. Campaigning is hard. You will have good days and bad days. It’s best to emulate the Stoics.
- Good communicators are worth their weight in gold. Treasure them, pay them well and give them the resources they need.
- This is hard work, and it is not easy. It is why so few people are good at it. But, if you do the work and follow some simple steps, your chances of getting what you want increase.
- Change takes time. A policy cycle takes five years. For implementation, add another five years. Get ready for the long haul. So, you need patience.
Books Mentioned
Chris Rose How to Win Campaigns
Chris Rose What Makes People Tick
Ros Atkins, The Art of Explanation: How to Communicate with Clarity and Confidence