Strategy Survival Guide

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Strategy Survival Guide Version 2.1 Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit home | strategy development | strategy skills | site index Strategy Skills > Managing Communications Evaluating communications Communications should be evaluated after each phase. A number of formal tools and 'off the shelf’ solutions are available as well as specialist companies offering media analysis and evaluation. Although independent analysis is best, these options are expensive and usually beyond the budget of projects. There are informal techniques that can be used to test the effectiveness of communications. Most depend on having identified key messages and target media in advance. (The intended message must be explicitly articulated before it is possible to evaluate whether anyone else understood it, or whether the message got through). A crude but effective form of media evaluation involves checking how many of the key messages were covered correctly in the stories that were published (for example, a story could score four out of five, or 80%). However, this can be skewed because it takes no account of where the story was published (e.g. national tabloid, broadsheet or trade journal) and its prominence (front page, page 2 etc, column inches). So there needs to be a balancing factor. This could be through ranking the publication by its appropriateness to target audiences. The scale needs to be large enough to show up a difference. It is usually sufficient to grade publications on a scale of 1-10. As an example, this could be: 10 = prominent story in national broadsheet or tabloid 6 = prominent story in an important specialist publication 4 = prominent story in a major regional 2 = story in non-target publication A further factor is tone – whether the story is positive or negative. For example a story may contain all the key messages, be in a prominent position in the target media but be fiercely opposed to the policies. The message has got through but not the argument. Again this needs a wide enough scale to reflect nuances of tone in the coverage. It is best to use a + /- scale that is centred at 0 for neutral coverage. For example: + 5 = a highly positive story 0 = a balanced story - 5 = a highly negative story. An overall score can be assigned using the formula: Score = (Message + Prominence) x Tone Users of this self-assessment tool usually tend to over-rate the negative and under-rate the positive. But while this system is crude it does give a useful pointer to how well the messages are getting through. Strengths • Ensures messages are understood clearly by users. Weaknesses • Can be time-consuming but should not be neglected. Strategy Survival Guide – Strategy Skills Page 86
Strategy Survival Guide Version 2.1 Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit home | strategy development | strategy skills | site index Strategy Skills > Managing Communications Preparing presentations > in practice Most projects will at some point require a presentation to be given to key stakeholders and other interested parties. These presentations are often a crucial part of the project, and their outcome can significantly impact the success of the work. The team stands a much greater chance of making a successful presentation - generating enthusiasm and commitment from stakeholders, if they present their analysis clearly and logically, with a compelling narrative. Storyboarding is a tool to help achieve this. What is Storyboarding? The storyboard is a tool originally developed in the film industry, and consists of a series of visual images that simply and briefly illustrate the film's key scenes and events. As with many 'buzzword’ terms, storyboarding has been used and misused in a variety of contexts other than filmmaking. Applied to projects and presentations, the most important parallels are as a means to sketch the flow of the narrative at the very early stages, seeking the most coherent way to link its component parts. By having a clear idea of the best way to construct the narrative, significant savings are made in work at the later stages, avoiding the need to change the structure once the slides have a lot of detail on them and are integrated more tightly. Secondly, having a clear narrative through the presentation will help avoid the tendency to present 'facts, facts, facts’, which is likely to make the presentation tedious for the audience. Initial Questions to Ask Before preparing a storyboard, there are a number of basic questions that need to be answered: • What do you want to achieve from the presentation? Are you planning to update the audience on general progress, or do you want to engage them in a discussion of particular issues? Are there specific decisions that you need them to make? • Who is your audience? The way you prepare your narrative will differ depending on whether you are presenting to an expert group, or a group who has never engaged with the issues before. Do you know if they want to hear a detailed analysis, or high-level conclusions? • How long do you have to make the presentation? It usually takes longer than you expect to present, particularly if the audience ask questions (which they should, if they are engaged with your work). Establish how long you will have to present (leaving time for questions) and from there, work out how many slides you can use. As a rule of thumb, it takes three minutes to present a basic slide with three or four points to explain. More complex slides will of course take longer to explain. The longer the presentation, the greater the need for clarity. • In what format are you going to present? With a small group it is easy to print out paper copies of your slides, with multiple slides on each page. This has the advantage of avoiding the need to organise a projector and laptop (as well as inopportune technical glitches!) and allows your audience to make notes more effectively. However, with printouts people can try and race ahead in the presentation, not being able to focus on your commentary at the same time. How much do you trust your audience, do they want to listen? With larger groups, providing individual printouts may not be possible, but nevertheless a projector has the advantage of being a single focal point for the room where you can more precisely control the flow of the narrative. Furthermore, it can act as a covert aide memoire in longer presentations for the narrator. Strategy Survival Guide – Strategy Skills Page 87
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Building an Evidence Base 113 Data
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A Framework for Strategic Direction
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Scenario development In Practice 1:
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events. There are a number of diffe
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For further material, see the Ratio
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