Winner
Context is Key: Repositioning OT Week 2023 During Geopolitical Upheavals
by Say Communications for Royal College of Occupational Therapists
Summary of work
The Royal College of Occupational Therapists’ biggest comms event, Occupational Therapy (OT) Week, takes place at the beginning of November. This year’s campaign, Occupation Matters, was conceived to increase awareness and understanding of the word occupation in the context of OT. However, with just a month to go Hamas attacked Israel from Gaza and concerns were raised about whether the campaign’s title was appropriate given the meaning of ‘occupation’ in its geo-political sense. By cancelling OT Week or diluting the campaign RCOT would miss this annual opportunity to raise awareness and understanding of OT. It was imperative to quickly address perceived concerns and change course while maintaining the objectives set at the outset.
While most members wanted OT Week to go ahead, we needed to be sensitive to the range of feelings amongst members. We recognised that context is key and that we needed to provide some additional narrative around the campaign. It was agreed that the OT Week campaign should go ahead but with some adjustments to ensure that it put occupation in the context of occupational therapy.
Amended OT Week materials were delivered in just four days and the campaign successfully launched on 5 November, smashing its KPIs.
Judges’ comments
Say Communications and the Royal College of Occupational Therapists achieved a real impact on the external environment and went through a significant process, highlighting real challenges and responses as well as transformation. The judges were impressed that they were able to demonstrate a very clear strategy that achieved good results with speed, which reflected both agility and flexibility in such a short time period.
