Title: Planning, implementing, monitoring and evaluating advocacy
Course: Level 3 - Health Education and Promotion > Section: Advocacy

You need well-planned activities to achieve your advocacy goals and objectives. You also need to identify and attract resources (money, equipment, volunteers, supplies and space) to implement your advocacy campaigns. The steps discussed in this section will help you when you are planning and implementing advocacy activities.These steps are:

A. Identifying a Problem

In this step, you must think more specifically about what you aim to do. You need to identify the problem that requires a policy action.

B. Knowing Your Audience

This means you should decide which audience to target through advocacy, and you must carefully determine the advocacy goals and objectives. At this stage, you are also identifying the policy makers you are trying to influence to support your issue. Examples include politicians, local officials and ministry officials.

C. Building Support

Build alliances with other groups, organisations and individuals who need to become committed to supporting you in your advocacy work on health issues. You should remember that the campaign will be most effective when individuals and organisations join in networks to increase the strength of your advocacy efforts (Figure 17.3).

Figure 13.3. In each community, you will be able to find model families who are keen to support your advocacy campaigns.

D. Developing Your Message

An advocacy message is a statement that may be tailored to different audiences. These messages define the issue, state solutions, and describe the actions that need to be taken.

E. Identifying the Channels of Communication

Identify the channels and the messages to be delivered to the various target audiences through radio, television, flyers, press conferences, or during meetings.

F. Resource Mobilization

This means you need to identify and attract resources such as money, equipment, volunteers, supplies and space to carry out your advocacy campaign.

G. Advocacy Activity

Once you have mobilised all necessary resources, you will be in a position to implement a set of planned activities, sometimes called an action plan, to achieve your advocacy objectives.

H. Monitoring and Evaluating the Activities

After you have already implement your advocacy campaign you need to monitor the process of an activity and gather information about how it is going, to measure progress towards your advocacy goal. Then evaluate the data gathered about the advocacy activities and analyse them to support each step of your advocacy campaign.