Well we might as well start with the punchline: Gellis has just won an IABC Gold Quill award. Naturally we want to tell everyone – it’s a great opportunity to talk about what we’ve been doing and raise our profile in general. But how does one select the right channels for such obvious self promotion and how can we talk about it in a way that makes people actually want to read it?

Well besides writing a blog on the dilemma of self-promotion, I think it probably helps if you have an interesting project to talk about. Fortunately our particular project touches upon debates of current interest. We were tasked with determining a strategy for persuading teachers (if we deemed that they were indeed persuadable) to talk to their kids about the value of the euro, the common currency. Given the current economic turmoil in the euro zone, I imagine there’d be interest in how the European Commission is communicating on the euro, and whatever one may think about the economic situation, it surely cannot be denied that it is appropriate for the Commission (or more specifically the Directorate General for Economic and Financial affairs, who we’ll call The Client) to have a voice and to play a role in reminding people of the euro’s benefits. But the problem with this kind of pro euro logic is that I can’t see it being a big seller for our award promotion. And where would we get to talk about why Gellis deserves some of the credit?

Well what Gellis did is really precisely the point and also gets us round the ‘cuddly euro’ dilemma. It’s all about evidence-based communications – finding out whether teachers even like the idea, whether there is space in the curriculum, and if so – what sort of tool would teachers be motivated to use? These are the sort of questions that the Commission should always be asking before it launches into ‘Yey us!’ mode and its great that DG ECFIN really get it. The lengths taken by Gellis – consulting nearly 1500 teachers, studying over 70 educational products, coordinating with 25 experts and raising the point that DG ECFIN should really look at what’s in its back yard (i.e. a whole lot of other Commission youth targeted projects to work with) before charging out the front door and down the road to the school – are then what makes the project particularly commendable.

So I’m hoping other communication geeks might be interested in our news – industry association newsletters and magazines certainly seem like good channels to aim a press release at if they can be persuaded to talk about other awards than their own that is. Of course the website and publications of the IABC itself will be receiving our symphonies of trumpeting.

George Ellis