The Foreign Service Journal, October 2006

might be to disseminate persua- sive arguments for committing troops to key audiences in each potential contributing country. But it would be a major produc- tion for the bureau’s PD office director to say whom the public affairs sections actually contacted. It doesn’t have to be that way. As embassies move to electronic distribution of press releases, event lists and information resource center packets, they generate data in digital form. Even where Internet access still limits digital dissemination, embassy staff have the computer tools and broadband connectivity to State’s networks. What they lack is a mandate and standards for reporting. The foundation of the record-keeping has to be the individual foreign audience member, yet contact lists are presently unstructured and fragmented. A study by State’s Office of eDiplomacy published in July 2004 found that several embassies were hard-pressed even to compose an invitation list for the annual Independence Day reception. The surveyed embassies used a variety of tracking tools from business-quality customer relation- ship management software to the proverbial shoebox full of business cards. Only one or two had integrated, embassywide systems. No single data standard exists. Until embassies can report consistently on output and basic audience responses (how many attended the speak- er program last night?), more significant performance measures are not likely to stand up under scrutiny. That’s a problem for the Office of Policy, Planning and Resources, established during Secretary Powell’s tenure and continued under Secretary Rice. Commercial pub- lic relations experts say that most businesses spend between 4 and 7 percent of their annual program budget on measuring effectiveness, utilizing relevant surveys and tools from other parts of the enterprise where possible. Some elements of a solution for PD are already there. The most important token of success is also the simplest and cheapest: the anecdotes identifying significant changes in the host government or society made possible or abetted by public diplomacy. The department already records thousands of such small victories in a database called RESULTS. Here are a couple of examples: “The local courts have liberalized their procedures after a senior judge returned from an international visitor grant”; or, “The government introduced a bill to protect intellectual property after a series of American speak- ers.” USIA developed standards to sort such results by rough order of magnitude, but that discipline flagged after entry into State. It should not be too hard to build the “results” approach into a full-scope system of measure- ment. The Gap in Expertise Since the incorporation of USIA into State, public diplomacy personnel have experienced massive turnover as senior officers retired or moved up to DCM slots and even ambassadorships. New recruits flooded in under Secretary Powell’s Diplomatic Readiness Initiative. The USIA-State consolidation also allowed officers from other cones to take assignments in public diplomacy. That is surely a good thing. The function is everyone’s job, and the public affairs section’s role is to steer and supplement the bilateral dialogue. PD is an ensemble, not a solo. However, the churn in overseas staffing raises the question of whether the new public affairs officers pos- sess sufficient command of their tradecraft. The GAO’s May report on public diplomacy in the Muslim world found a notable all-round shortage in PD expertise: “One senior State official said that administrative duties, such as budget, personnel and internal reporting, com- pete with officers’ public diplomacy responsibilities. Another official in Egypt told us that there was rarely enough time to strategize, plan or evaluate her pro- grams.” State officials in Washington acknowledged that “additional requirements for posts to improve strategic planning and evaluation of their public diplo- macy programs would need to be accompanied by addi- tional staff with relevant expertise.” The Foreign Service Institute rebuilt and expanded PD training in 2003-2004. However, the need for pro- fessional development is still daunting. Anyone who thinks training is not important should consider a few qualifications that I think an ambassador has a right to expect of his or her PAO: F O C U S 50 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / O C T O B E R 2 0 0 6 It would not be too hard to build the RESULTS approach into a full-scope system of measurement.