Evaluating three flagship programmes to strengthen how the EU promotes linguistic diversity.
The Directorate-General for Translation runs three major initiatives promoting multilingualism and translation across Europe: a translation competition for secondary schools, a professional forum for the language industry, and a continent-wide celebration of linguistic diversity. Each serves different audiences—students, professionals, and general citizens—but shares the goal of championing translation and multilingualism.
DGT wanted an external evaluation to understand how well their communications were working and how to better reach audiences less familiar with EU topics. The brief covered four phases: preparation, assessment, recommendations, and training delivery.
The bridging gap: How do you evaluate communications effectiveness across three distinct programmes with different audiences, then translate findings into practical improvements the team can implement?
My role: From evaluation to implementation
I was commissioned to conduct a comprehensive external evaluation, moving from analysis through to recommendations and hands-on training.
Phase 1: Discovery and data gathering
I reviewed internal documents including communication strategies, event post-mortems, and strategic plans. I conducted 12 stakeholder interviews with DGT team members, analysed a full year of social media data (March 2023–March 2024) using Emplifi analytics, and performed peer analysis of comparable organisations.
Phase 2: Framework development
I developed evaluation frameworks tailored to the assessment, including a DGT-specific Logic Model mapping inputs to outcomes and impact for each programme, and SWOT analyses for each initiative. I also created three detailed audience profiles to ground recommendations in audience needs.
Phase 3: Analysis and recommendations
I produced a comprehensive findings report covering cross-project patterns, programme-specific evaluations, social media performance analysis, and content audits by platform. Recommendations were prioritised by impact and feasibility.
Phase 4: Training delivery
I developed and delivered training modules addressing identified communication gaps, facilitated workshops on implementing improved strategies, and provided resources for sustained implementation.
What I delivered
Comprehensive evaluation report: Detailed findings covering effectiveness, engagement, and messaging consistency across all three programmes with specific recommendations for each.
Logic model framework: A custom evaluation tool mapping the relationship between DGT's inputs, activities, outputs, outcomes, and intended impact, applicable across all programmes.
Audience profiles: Three detailed profiles (professional translators, students and families, general EU citizens) with channel preferences, pain points, and content recommendations for each.
Social media performance analysis: Platform-by-platform analysis including format effectiveness, engagement patterns, growth trends, posting cadence, and benchmarking against industry standards.
Content audit: Topic, tone, and format analysis for each channel with specific recommendations for what works and what to change.
Strategic recommendations: Actionable recommendations including communication pillars, channel prioritisation, measurement frameworks, and an always-on content approach beyond event periods.
Training programme: Tailored training addressing identified gaps, with materials for sustained implementation.
Key insight
Communications evaluation isn't just about measuring what happened, it's about building frameworks that help teams make better decisions going forward. The most valuable output wasn't the findings themselves, but the Logic Model and measurement frameworks that gave DGT a systematic way to evaluate their own effectiveness and connect activities to intended outcomes.
