When I arrived at the British Embassy in Vienna on 29 August 2016 one of my first meetings was with my excellent Press and Public Affairs (PPA) team.
Part of the work of diplomats is to explain to people what we do; and draw attention to good things that link our countries together. For example, if a brilliant Austrian student wins a British Council Global Study Award, it’s right that we should highlight that.
Result: we draw attention to the work of the British Council and to studying in the UK as well as Jürgen’s achievement. And, with luck, even more people will apply for future British Council initiatives.
That’s why the British Embassy in Vienna has a rather good Facebook page (please Like us!); and why I have both a Twitter account and an Instagram account (I’ll be delighted if you follow me on either, or both).
The UK is doing a lot of good stuff in Austria. We want people to know about it and join in.
Another part of the message is that diplomats are human beings and are interested in the countries to which they’re posted. In my last job, in Istanbul, I had a Twitter hashtag called #reasonstolikeIstanbul – I did 638 of them altogether, although I know there are many more reasons to like Istanbul than that.
Here in Austria I’ve started a series called #keenonWien, though I’m open to better suggestions! So far they don’t have numbers.
The above-mentioned PPA team, meanwhile, had a great idea: why not do an introductory video setting out what my job involved? To add interest, I could speak German, and use some words from Austria’s diverse dialects, including Viennese (Wienerisch) and Tyrolean (Tirolerisch).
So I did – watch it here (in German):
Apart from the challenges of getting my mouth around such tongue-twisters as “Oachkatzlschwoaf” (Tyrolean dialect for a squirrel’s tail) and “strawanzen” (Vienna dialect for “wandering around”), the video was a great opportunity to deliver messages about my work as Ambassador to Austria and UK Permanent Representative to the International Organisations in Vienna.
By bringing together the dialect and the message, we were able to reach a wider audience than we might have done with a “straight” message video. Since we published the video on 13 September it’s been watched more than 4,000 times on YouTube and 5,000 times on Facebook.
Response has been positive, with lots of warm tweets from Austria and beyond, and press coverage including the kind headline in the on-line edition of Austria’s most-read newspaper the Kronen Zeitung (in German) “British Ambassador conquers Austria’s hearts”.
After the next two weeks, when I’m expecting to spend most of my time at the UN attending the IAEA Board of Governors and the IAEA General Conference, I look forward to visiting more of the Austrian regions.
I’ll report back on what I find – including any fascinating new dialect words.