Well it feels like the world just ended, but thought I’d post this anyway. Life goes on and all that.
The title to this post was my exam question for a recent discussion with the comms team at ODI. My initial reaction was 
‘you’re top of the heap already, relax’, but then I got to thinking about a couple of areas where ODI, and most other development ‘knowledge brokers’ (or whatever they call themselves these days), can sharpen up.
Where are the personalities?
The ODI is full of interesting, quirky, funny people, but you would never guess that from the website or the output. Why not? Apart from anything else, personality boosts traffic. Why not get ODI staff vlogging on their field visits, to give a sense of what they do and who they are? Why not let people sign up for notifications of blogs by named ODI staff, rather than the corporate beast? Where’s the cult of personality around the Director?
Can you help us read LESS?
Sure, ODI churns out vast amounts of research, and wants us to read it, but one of the main kinds of feedback I get on this blog is ‘thanks for reviewing XX, because you saved me loads of time reading it’. I really like the ODI’s quarterly ‘resilience scan’ for the same reason (wish they would do one on Doing Development Differently). It is also really good at infographics, videos, blogging its papers etc. Most people in the aid and development business (and everywhere else) suffer from information overload, so people and institutions that can summarize, signpost and shortcut are worth their weight in gold (and printer ink). Book reviews, ‘listicles’ – ’10 things you need to know about the latest development fuzzword’, ‘bluffer’s guide to social enterprise, payment by results, resilience for dummies etc’. Or why not pick up the World Bank’s David Evans’ trick of summarizing all the papers at a given conference, with links (I think 150 papers is probably his record so far)?
Interactivity
You go to ODI to receive wisdom. That doesn’t encourage much interaction – very few comments on most blogs, no polls, few debates on genuine dilemmas. That also has a dampening effect on potential engagement by the public.
Snakeoil v Scattergun
It’s interesting to compare ODI with its main competitor in the aid/development sector – the Center for Global Development. CGD has arguably got a much sharper approach to marketing – it takes time to develop a new idea, invests in finding a good name for it (‘Cash on Delivery’, ‘Commitment to Development Index’), puts together teams to work on it, and then remorselessly bangs home the need for the product (whatever the problem, CoD seems to be part of the solution). ODI is much more ‘let a hundred flowers bloom’ and then different sectors can pick the flowers they like. Personally, I prefer the ODI model – more diverse, more compatible with messy, complex systems, but you do dilute the brand, sacrificing profile and possibly impact.
That was my initial tirade. The reactions from the ODI comms gurus were interesting. They were
For some reason they don’t always say ‘whoopee’
worried that warts and all ‘vlogs from the field’ might dilute the aura of authority and expertise they work hard to build. I disagree – as long as you clearly demarcate ‘work in progress’ from final product, the fact that researchers do actually get out of London and talk to poor people can only enhance their credibility.
Their other response was more tricky. Some researchers are natural communicators, but others are, how can we put it, happier with their spreadsheets. How to drag them blinking into the light? My advice would be don’t even try – bitter experience has shown me you can’t force introverted researchers into becoming bloggers, at least not good ones. Better to spot the researchers who like communicating and support them.
The support can be direct (eg if they don’t like writing accessibly, get them to vlog, or interview them, write it up and get them to approve the text). Be ready to mentor them as they start trying stuff out. Lots of upfront training may be counterproductive – it just turns something easy like making a video on your phone, into a big chore.
But support can also be indirect, through improved feedback loops. Why not circulate a list of staff’s media hits every month (traditional and social media)? Or get audiences to feed back on panellists and presentations, then tell everyone in ODI the results? That could shift institutional incentives towards comms a bit.
And the one massive thing I completely forgot to mention, so will do so now – MOOCs. ODI is totally suited to run Massive Open Online Courses that fill the gap between social media and reading inaccessible research. What’s holding them back?
Any other suggestions for ODI?
And here’s a vlog summary recorded early in the morning in Lisbon. For some reason I’m talking very fast despite geese honking and a mild hangover- not a good look, I think we can agree.