Thursday, November 26, 2009

Cours de formation aux Media Sociaux au Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres

La semaine derniere, le Departement de Formation du Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres israelien a inaugure un nouveau cours : « Diplomatie a l’age des Media Sociaux »

Ouvrir un cours special centre sur les Media Sociaux est un tout premier pas, non seulement pour notre ministere mais aussi pour tout le secteur public israelien.
Le but principal de ce programme est la formation des diplomates a l’utilisation des outils propres aux media sociaux. Le cours comprend trois parties :
1. Connaissances de base est les outils fondamentaux propres aux Media Sociaux– reseaux sociaux, blogs, wikis, etc.
2. Revue d’ examples de Gouvernment 2.0 et Diplomatie 2.0 en Israel et dans le monde.
3. exercices pratiques sur l’usage des outils propres aux Media Sociaux dans le travail diplomatique.
Je vous tiendrai au courant quant aux prochaines rencontres sur mon blog et Twitter

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Social Media training in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Last week the training department of the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs opened the new course: "Diplomacy in the age of Social Media".

It's the first time not just in our Ministry, but in the Israel public sector in general, that there is a special training program dealing with social media skills.

The major goal of this program is to train the diplomats to use the tools of social media in their work. The course includes three parts:
- basic knowledge and skills in social media, including social networks, blogging, wikis,
- review of the best practices of Government 2.0 and Diplomacy 2.0 in Israel and in the world
- practical exercices and sumulation of social media use in diplomatic work.

I'll update more on the meetings of the course (scheduled once a week), here and on twitter.

Friday, November 20, 2009

US embassy in China reaches out to citizens through social networks

Look here:
http://ow.ly/Dvgn

This is the essence of what the diplomats stationes on the host countries should when they plan public diploamcy through social media tools.

Friday, November 13, 2009

Diplomacy 2.0 - the Israel experience

Here is the PP presentation, about the use of Web 2.0 tools by Israeli diplomats, since 2004.

There are also some tips on how to work with social media.

http://ovdeimedina.ning.com/group/web20/forum/topics/short-pp-presentation-on

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

EuroMed Training of Public Administration - notes from Rome conference

Last week (October 27-28) I represented our Ministry's Training Bureau in the Second Meeting of the EMPTA Network - the network of representatives from Public Administration Instituitions in the Euro-Mediterranean area. The conference was held in the Scuola Superiore della Pubblica Amministrazione, Rome http://www.sspa.it/ (below see a symbol of the school).






The conference was a real success. First of all, the fact that the representatives coming from countries which don't have diplomatic relations, sit around the table and talk to each other - is an achievement in itself. There were no discussions of political situation - just the dialogue about the issues important to all of us - in Israel, Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Tunisia, Turkey, and of course our European neighbours.


We were discussing the skills and competencies that are necessary for all public servants in our area. Despite the differences in our cultures, in our backgrounds and our political systems - the conclusion was that we have many things in common, and we could share our knowledge to help each other to define best training practices for the public servants. The description of the conference is here http://www.sspa.it/index.php?mod=pagina&id=1717,


and its program here: http://www.sspa.it/share/pagine/1717/EN-Programme%20Euromed_26_10_09.pdf


The EMPTA network has been launched 5 years ago, and succeeded in creating commitment among its members to work towards defining contents of a common training pathway for civil servants. Moreover, the network members expressed their interest in creating training course for senior civil servants. The special Scientific Committee meeting was held at the end of the conference to discuss the program of the training seminar for public servants from EuroMed area.


The central point in the presentation I've made during the Roundtable "Common Elements for leadership training in the Euro-Mediterranean area" was the digital aspect of the public servant competencies. One of my proposals dealt with creating social network for the members of the EMPTA network. In the working group of the conference I reiterated this idea, stressing the importance of the Web 2.0 outreach by public administration to the young generation. It was nice to hear that other participants in the conference expressed their support of this idea.


No doubt, there is a lot of work ahead of the EMPTA network. The cultural, institutional and language difference make the dialogue more difficult. The political situation in the area is volatile, and as one of the european participants put it: "We must be very realistic about what we could and what we couldn't achieve. It's still unrealistic to see the exchange of public servants between Israel and many of its arab neighbours".

However, we must be optimistic and do what we can. We should show good examples of the regional cooperation: those that already accomplished thier goals, and those that are to be implemented. We should feature the positive examples, and there is nothing wrong about it. For too long time, too many people were focusing on bad experiences...


The conference was a success thanks to a wonderful organizational work done by SSPA and EIPA. The director of SSPA, Valeria Termini, director of International Relations Office, Stefano Pizzicannella, Sarlo Santoro and Dominique Bourdenet from SSPA, Javier Cano, Stephanie Horel and Monica Casares from EIPA - Thank you all!


And of course, last but not least, another reason for the conference success - the city of Rome itself... The weather, the food, the athmosphere...



Here are some pictures from the conference:






with Valeria Termini, Director of SSPA





with Hans Kunsmann, Director for European Affairs in BAKOV