In addition to the issue of strategic risk, you should also predict the challenges and responses you will get from partners and opponents on your proposals and ideas when honing or finally shaping your activities and messages.
In designing an advocacy message based on research and analysis, there are basic challenges that you need to be ready to address from the start. There is a tendency at the beginning of advocacy discussions based on research to try to quickly undermine or delegitimize the project and quickly consign it to the dustbin. These challenges usually come from questions about the credibility, relevance,1 and utility2 of the research3, so you will need to design your messages and communication tools to have a shelf life beyond what is vividly referred to as the “policy primordial soup.”4 Therefore, the aim is to get your audiences past the question of whether it is worth engaging with your research project.
Predicting responses prepares you to defend your position in the debate.
As such, there are a number of considerations based on the potential responses of target audiences that may push you to sharpen, shape, focus, support, or polish your messages and campaign plan. Taking both points of challenges and potential responses, this section on the following:
- Defend the credibility of research, analysis and evidence
- Take into account irrational responses
- Get ready to manage the predicted responses