I. What does it mean to
continue without EC funding? (activities,
partnership, resources)
Challenges:
- Significant decreases in budget;
- A short-term contraction of the Network;
- The need to prioritise: having to think carefully
about what you choose to do (and not do);
- A change in mindset, from receiving money, to
chasing money from Network members;
- Having discussions about ‘contributions in kind’;
- You are no longer insulated from the economic
climate (for co-ordination activities);
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I. What does it mean to
continue without EC funding? (activities,
partnership, resources)
Opportunities:
- A reduction in bureaucracy;
- Greater flexibility;
- A ‘true-picture’ of organisations commitment to
building the ERA
- The ability to think more widely about the benefits
that can be derived for members – for example, to
refocus away from ‘set-piece’ joint calls towards
practical contributions to policy and operational staff
- sharing of expertise
- mobilisation of staff
- joint briefing papers
II. Becoming selfsustainable (minimum joint
activities and interest to justify an selfsustained network, minimum resources)
- Minimum resources: 100k Eur per annum;
- Joint calls are a good way to bind members
together over an extended period of time. However,
they can be slow to deliver (i.e. they require
patience from subscription payers);
- Communications are vital – via website,
newsletter, telecon and email
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III. Governance structures
(minimum organisational requirements)
-Try to preserve some continuity in
governance arrangements from FPfunding, but recast them in ‘light-touch’
terms;
- The independent Network will need a
mission, a vision and an agreed plan of
work going forwards;
- Try and retain a secretariat, preferably in
one physical location. They can also act
as the ‘banker’ for the Network;
IV. Some suggested best practice
- Switch to ‘light-touch’ interactions to support
established relationships: make increased use of
telecons, virtual meetings’, and where possible,
video-conferences;
- Look at the use of wiki sites as ways of
exchanging views and compiling joint documents;
- Ensure a minimum of one, and up to three
network meetings or workshops per year;
- produce transparent, annual accounts to all
members;
- retain your ambition;
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V. Interactions between
self-sustainable networks
- Have been limited so far. However,
parallel experiments are being observed in
the case of SNOWMAN and CRUE;
- Formal and informal mechanisms exist
for the sharing of best practice;
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