Policymakers tend to be pressed for time and receive too much information. Those who want their arguments to influence policy must learn how to structure and communicate data and key messages as clearly as possible to the ministerial / cabinet level. In this 2-day skills-building workshop, EMPA students will learn how to structure a policy paper, write an executive summary and formulate recommendations vis-à-vis policymakers. They will also analyse the strengths and weaknesses of selected policy briefs.
This two-day EMPA skills course helps participants to:
• Understand the various background conditions governing information overload in the sphere of policy and devise ways in which to increase the potential for writing to have an impact on the readership;
• Produce effective policy writing: understanding / scanning your audience; choosing among types and templates of policy papers; asking about the who, what and why of a policy brief;
• Test various templates for executive summaries and learn how to structure them; learn how to tailor recommendations and present policy choices;
• recognise and work with cognitive biases shared by decision-makers;
• Understand that all policy writing can potentially be improved (and actually improve writing in the context of exercises and a clinic);
• Avoid certain expressions and features in policy writing – detail, wordiness, clichés, etc. – and know how to apply this guidance to their actual writing (in classical style) of a policy brief;
• Understand why certain policy papers have more impact than others: some employ stale bureaucratese; others excel in clarity, use data at crucial points of the argument, build up dialectics as part of dramatic sequencing and provide a policy solution that use imagery in a strategic manner.