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1. Public Awareness
What is it? Why do it? How to do it?
Presentation by ILRI Public Awareness team
ILRI Komms Klinics session
ILR Nairobi, 10 July 2012

2. The Komms Klinics approach
• Away from (just) tools, into communication
processes
• Six broad communication areas
• Tools are still part of the picture
• Awareness raising and hands-on training
sessions
• More trainers, more trainees

3. The Komms Klinics approach

4. What is public awareness at ILRI?
2. As a service
INCREASE SUPPORT FOR—AND IMPACTS OF—ILRI-PARTNER
WORK
Raise intellectual and financial support for livestock research for
development, particularly that conducted by ILRI and its strategic
partners, and help widen and deepen the positive impacts of ILRI
and partner work.
2. As a unit at ILRI
A 2.5-person unit whose main responsibility is to help the institute and
its staff do the above.

5. What public awareness
is not about at ILRI?
A central unit that manages/controls relations with the general public to build
ILRI’s brand for better sales marketing.
ILRI
PA
Project Public
ILRI PA
Project
Public

6. What public awareness
is about at ILRI?
Staff at all levels sharing/engaging with targeted interested
publics to influence policy, change mindsets, empower
communities, put research into use, raise funds, change
behaviour . . . .

7. Examples of public awareness
products
PRINT
Brochures (project snapshots)
Corporate reports (institutional overviews)
Posters (message-driven)
Exhibits (displays and handouts)
News releases
ONLINE
Blogs for stories (Wordpress)
Films/Photofilms (YouTube/Blip.tv)
Images and image collections (Flickr)
Slide presentations (Slideshare)
OTHER
Speeches at events
Media interviews
Fundraising campaigns

8. Importance of story
What drives effective public awareness at ILRI is story
married to evidence
•Examples---
from conversations to single statements and photo captions to
summaries to articles to news releases to opinion pieces to essays to
still images to films.
Only humans tell stories.
We are wired for story-telling.
And for learning through listening to stories.

9. Importance of quality
What makes an organization stand out is:
2. the quality of the products it produces---
from its science products to its publications
to its communications to its brand
4. the closeness of the marriage of what it does
and how it communicates what it does.
Examples of high-quality products
married to high-quality communications
• Delia Grace’s report to a donor on zoonoses becomes
major media story
• African Development Bank concept notes become high-profile
VIP donor briefs
• Stories from the field become powerful photofilms
• Syntheses of research findings become corporate reports

10. Importance of relevance
What gives an organization staying power is its relevance
• Xerox PARC research lab lost its innovations to Apple computers
• Kodak filed for bankruptcy this year
The revolution that truly put ‘public’ in ‘public awareness’
• 1984 Apple computer and LaserWriter printer.
• How that has changed how we ‘go to work’.

11. New trends in public awareness
• Engaging publics and policymakers rather than informing them
• Personal learning and knowledge management
• ‘Working out loud’ all along the way
• Co-creating messages, facilitating discussions
CHANGE
AHEAD

12. Examples of effective
ILRI public awareness
• Blog: Livestock Markets Digest
• Book: ILRI Mapping Climate vulnerability and poverty in
Africa
• Opinion pieces: by Carlos Sere (Globe &Mail, Herald
Tribune, New york times, The independent, The
Guardian, SciDevNet)
• Communications campaign: Like that which was part of
the research project from the beginning: IBLI
• Pro-poor advocacy: incorporated in research project:
SDP

13. 3 things to start doing today
to get public attention
Talk among yourselves, to your neighbor, to your team what’s happening,
e.g. event, workshop, new paper coming out.
Share what you have (slides, photos, scientific posters) using social media.
Ask your Comms team to help you get attention for your work.
Talk to us. Create with us. Use us.

14. More about Komms Klinics
• Visit our Komms Klinics training wiki:
http://ilri-training.wikispaces.com
• Find out more and contact:
• - Tsehay or Ewen in Addis,
• - Angela or Evelyn in Nairobi
• Find answers to communication questions:
http://ilri-comms.wikispaces.com
• Find out about the activities of ILRI’s
communication team: http://infoilri.wordpress.com

15. International Livestock Research Institute
Better lives through livestock
Animal agriculture to reduce poverty, hunger and
environmental degradation in developing countries
ILRI
www.ilri.org

16. Reflection: What should be 1-2 priorities for you, your
team, ILRI to get our work better known publicly
• Think for 3 min about this – put your own priority on
a colour card
• Discuss this around your table (groups of 4-5) for
10 min maximum
• Capture your results on a flipchart sheet
• Share your key insights back with us (1. Addis, 2.
Nairobi) 10-15 min