MAIA holds its first 1st Thematic Working Group on Communication 

This month, the MAIA project celebrated the first of 6 thematic workshops. These sessions are designed to create synergies between EU-funded climate change research projects, as well as share resources and provide training to improve their communication, branding and marketing. 

This first working group centred on communication and was attended by the following projects:

• Project Agora, which works to communicate climate change to marginalised groups, the elderly, and other civil society groups, promoting inclusivity.
  
• The Localised Project, which creates tools for businesses, small/medium communities, and cities to reshape local decarbonization and adaptation planning. Read the full article for more details.
  
• Holistic, which explores holistic use of scientific models and scenarios for energy and environmental planning.
  
• The EERIE Project, which explores the role of ocean eddies in climate.
  
• The UK Met Office, which is working on Earth System models and prediction of weather events, as well as working with the Climate Research Network. 

During the session, MAIA Work Package 5 partner Pilar Pascual, Creative Director of Off Course Design Studio and Laia Palau, Art Director at Off Course, presented the MAIA Multiply initiative—a MAIA project initiative to connect and disseminate the projects. 

As part of MAIA Multiply, expert facilitators work with participating projects to refine their communication strategy and create content to leverage MAIA’s extensive networks and amplify project reach within the Quadruple Helix. The aim is to amplify the impact of climate research funded by Horizon Europe and Horizon 2020.

This was followed by a presentation from Work Package 5 partner Carlos León, General Manager of Thatzad, outlining the marketing help they will offer in subsequent sessions. 

There then followed a discussion focusing on common needs and uncertainties faced by the projects when it comes to communicating their work. All attendees expressed an interest in understanding the common messages and language they should use when speaking to their audience. 

Attendees then discussed ways to collaborate, in line with one of the core goals of the MAIA project. Additionally, how MAIA’s services fit into existing networking and sharing initiatives like GreenDeal Support Office workgroups. 

Action items from the session included:

• The need for the workgroup to come up with a list of common needs
• Identification of practical actions to take together, such as creation of content relating to common research areas, as well as videos for the projects 
• Identification of overlapping actions with other initiatives
• Creation of shared channels for communications and information sharing between the projects 
• Creation of a shared newsletter 
• Introduce the projects to the MAIA partner responsible for the Marketplace so their platform can be added 
• ThatzAd l contact them by email and ask several questions regarding their website in order to offer them consultancy.

To participate in an upcoming Thematic Working Group, please contact glorenzoni@inmedia.es 

MAIA is a Horizon Europe project that acts as an impact multiplier for climate research projects funded under Horizon Europe and Horizon2020 programs. It brings together the experience of several carefully curated Horizon 2020 projects that focus on innovation for climate resilience, including BINGO, BRIGAID, CLARITY, Connecting Nature, DRIVER+, PLACARD, and RESCCUE. The primary objective of MAIA is to make the current dispersed knowledge more interoperable, accessible, and usable and to render the outcomes economically sustainable.

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