Friday 4 December 2015

7 essential sourcebooks for development communications professionals

Are you into communications? To be specific, if you are into development communications and need to develop a communications strategy for your organisation or a campaign, what steps do you follow?

If you haven’t gone through my earlier post on developing a communications strategy, here’s a quick recap.

  • Analyse the background
  • Formulate goals and objectives
  • Analyse the target audience
  • Develop the key messages
  • Craft the call-to-action
  • Design the tools and activities
  • Set a budget and timeline
  • Monitor the actions and measure the impacts

For a bird’s-eye view, develop a communication matrix so that you find everything on a single page starting from the communication goals and objectives to the communication channels you will be using to meet the objectives. A communications calendar will be an added advantage.

If you want to go through the process once more, here’s a link to make your job easier.

To analyse the situation, here’s how you carry out the PEST (Political, economic, social and technological), SWOT (Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) and competitor analyses

Now, if you want to delve much deeper into developing communication strategies, here are seven essential sourcebooks that will help you hone your skills.


Development Communication Sourcebook: Broadening the Boundaries of Communication
By Paolo Mefalopulos
The World Bank


Communication for Rural Development: Sourcebook
FAO


Writing a communication strategy for development programmes: A guideline for programme managers and communication officers
UNICEF




Strategic Communication for Sustainable Development: A conceptual overview
GIZ


Communication for Development: Strengthening the effectiveness of the United Nations
FAO, ILO, UNAIDS, UNICEF, UNDP, UNESCO, WHO


How to use communication to make aid effective: Strategies and principles for programme-based approaches
BBC World Service Trust


At the heart of change: The role of communication in sustainable development
Panos London

Visit this page to download related documents.

And here's a case for communication in sustainable development.


The case for communication in sustainable development
Panos London

If you are interested in research communication, this guidebook can be of much help.


Guidance note on research communication 
DFID

Also have a look at the below:

Toolkit on Communication for Development (C4D)
Six useful guides on communication strategy

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