Our UN-Day 09 Action Report

Our United Nations Day 09 Report.

The decision to organize an individual low key UN-Day supporting action was made, while planning to travel (ca 8 weeks) during the run-up to UN-Day, Oct 24th 2009.

It was anticipated that the conditions to run a focused UN-Day support action would not be present during that travel. (ex: Limited Internet accessibility, divided focus , limited and/or irregular communications..)

The first rationale behind the decision to act in promotion of UN-Day was that ‘doing something’ to raise awareness for UN-Day was more important than ‘doing nothing at all’.

Another motivation was to deliberately leave the ‘comfort zone’ by acting under limited conditions, and thus to learn as much as possible.



Following intentions and actions were considered doable:


1- To test out a low key concept of a UN-Day Celebration idea, while raising effectively some awareness for UN-Day 09.
2- Setting up a United Nations Day blog.
3- Setting up a Face book Group: “Our United Nations Day”
4- A few hundred e-mails would be sent out in order to solicit support for the UN-Day 09 idea/action.
5- An inventory of all the UN-Day 09 activities worldwide.
6- Deliver a final report of our low key UN-Day 09 idea/action.



As of October 28th 2009, the following results were achieved:


1- The encouraging endorsement of 10 international groups:
• The African Union Chamber of Commerce.
• The International Dance Council
• The Seal the Deal Organization
• The www.350.org
• The Africa Millennium Development network
• Dyslexia international
• The American Diversity Report
• Inner Bonding
• The Orphans International
• The World Craft Council

2- A United Nations Day blog was set up and several different articles were posted. However, due to technical glitches (inability to post pictures and video’s) and insufficient blogging expertise, no feed-back was reported.

3- An ‘Our UN-Day” Face book Group was set up one month prior UN-Day and attracted a 80 members. Several UN-Day related articles and video’s were posted .
Several Face book Group members replied to UN-Day related inputs and some people actively supported the UN-Day 09 idea/action.

4- A Professor of Sustainable Development of the University of Cancun, Mexico, communicated the possibility to join forces in order to draft strategic intentions/cooperation for the (eventual) UN-Day 2010 Celebration.




UN-Day 09 idea/action SWOT Analysis


Strong points:- Action effectively organized under difficult circumstances.
- Encouraging endorsement of several international
organizations.
- The concept to celebrate our common humanity on UN-Day
seems to be understood and accepted on a general level.
- A blog and face book group were indeed set up.
- A sense of direction to build on this UN-Day 09 idea/action
took shape.
- Potential leaders became interested in the UN-Day idea.
- Offer to post article in 4 international newsletters
- A view of what happen –globally- on UN-Day was acquired.


Weaknesses:

- No thorough plan prior action.
- Actions was conducted with (too) limited time commitment.
- As it was an individual action, there was no supporting team.
- No framework in place to communicate effectively and
individually with all incoming endorsements and responses.
- UN-Day Blog reported technical problems . These were not
adequately addressed.
- UN-Day blog: Irregular postings.
- UN-Day Face book: Irregular and no uniformity in style of
the communications.
- UN-Day Face book did not generate active involvement of
Face book members.
- Some Face book Group members who committed to advance
the UN-Day 09 idea/action did not live up their promise.
- Some Face book members did not understand the purpose
of the action.
- Running an online action without a fix home-address/basis
reduces greatly the credibility.
- Absence of interactive issue related website.


Opportunities:

- The UN-Day idea seems to attract individual and
organizational support.
- To frame the UN-Day idea into a clear summarizing concept.
- The possibility to draft a precise strategic plan of intentions.
- To set measurable goals/objectives for the coming year(s).
- To strive for a committed leadership team.
- To learn a lot about the broader UN-Structure.
- To take effectively part in a truly UN-empowering action.


Threats:

- “Our UN-Day” Concept has not yet an organizational
structure. (One individual)
- No personal contacts/meetings between virtual UN-Day
collaborators and/ore teams.
- Inconsistent communication with Face book members, UN-
Day Blog and endorsing international organizations: danger
of losing very valuable contacts or credibility.


Conclusion UN-Day action 2009:

- This UN-Day idea/intention/action is able to rally and international interest and approval.

- A clear/concise plan of action and a considerable and sustained time and energy commitment will be absolutely required in order to build the basic structure to ensure a viable and growing mid-long term successful endeavour.

- A time frame between 10 to 15 years consistent and well organized actions will be needed to achieve the realization of the intentions.


Thank YOU:

- for your interest and contributions; without you, this action had not been taken!

With warm regards,

Jean-Paul