Digital Diplomacy

The FCDO's digital work

20th May 2016 London, UK

Liz Hitchcock

Digital Training and Upskilling Manager

Digital training and capability at FCO: a new strategic approach

Digital training at the FCO has reached toddler-hood. Claire Collins blogged in November about its one year birthday and now, just like a toddler, it’s good at attracting attention and charming all who meet it! FCO staff who’ve taken up the Digital Transformation Unit (DTU) global training offer have been overwhelmingly positive about the quality […]

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10th May 2016 London, UK

Stacey Cartwright

Digital Transformation Manager

Email Triage: helping customers find what they need on GOV.UK

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s consular service supports British people around the world when they are most in need of our help. Consulates, embassies and high commissions publish their contact email addresses in the contact section of their pages. I hear that sharp intake of breath. How generous of them when most others hide behind […]

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27th April 2016 London, UK

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by Lorey Campese

Head of Digital, UK Mission to the United Nations in New York

Opening a window in the smoke-filled room: Twitter and the #nextSG

Six years ago to the day, I signed into Twitter for the first time. At the time I was studying for exams and though I had a budding interest in the United Nations (UN), the concept of diplomacy was frankly pretty alien. Little did I know, about a half decade later, I would sit at […]

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26th April 2016 London, UK

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by Phil Buckley

Digital Transformation Manager

Emergency travel documents online: getting people home the complicated way

This is actually a bit harder than I realised

Last year I wrote a number of ‘Photo casebooks’ talking about what an emergency travel document is, and our plans to digitise the application process for an emergency travel document. The project is still invitation only, but has now been rolled out worldwide; and at least until our legalisation online project goes live, it is […]

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15th March 2016 London, UK

Samantha Luchmun and Steven Linzell

Regional Web Publishing Officer and Digital Communications Officer, Madrid

Lights, Video, Action: engaging audiences with visual content

Use of video is increasing across the network of British Embassies and High Commissions around the world – and with good reason. Video can be an effective way of communicating difficult, technical messages. It is more engaging than just publishing a text update. It gives you the chance to use more than 140 characters in […]

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26th February 2016 London, England

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by Greg Dorey

Diplomat

Nation Shall Tweet Tweets Unto Nation….

It is pretty rare these days for a British Ambassador or equivalent not to engage in social media – something that sets us apart from the vast majority of other countries’ emissaries (with notable exceptions). But at a time when diplomacy has progressively less to do with government to government (G2G) interaction and more to […]

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11th February 2016 London, UK

Tony Worron

Desk Officer for Geographical Information Policy

Spreading the word (and data) on country names

We’ve been working with the Government Digital Service (GDS) on a project to develop a “Country Register” which will be a dataset of UK approved geographical names for countries and territories. This work is the first stage of a project to create a range of Registers which will be a key part of the UK’s […]

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22nd January 2016 London, UK

Communications evaluation training Amsterdam to Zagreb – all from a small office in Cornwall

Earlier this year we heard Stephen Linzell talk about how we are using a digital analysis tool to manage the FCO’s online presence, evaluate our campaigns and respond to crises. He spoke about how we were beginning to use Ripjar, one of a suite of tools we have, to help us do this. We hope […]

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21st January 2016 London, UK

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by Steven Linzell

Digital Communications Officer, Madrid

Building (digital) platforms for discussion – something we should do more of in 2016

Digital and diplomacy: it hasn’t always been easy to put the two together. Over time our use of digital has matured, become more sophisticated and, we hope, more effective. Seeing the online activity from around the network, one thing has stood out above all else – the ability to engage, and, through that, the opportunity […]

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