SHAR-Q

Since the involvement of stakeholders and potential end-users of the technologies and components to be developed in SHAR-Q is regarded as crucial from the beginning to ensure the project success, a stakeholder engagement strategy - whose foundations were already set in the SHAR-Q Dissemination and Communication Plan - has been defined and put into practice, leading to overall positive results.

During the first project year, the Stakeholder Advisory Board (SAB) and the Interested Stakeholder Group (ISG) have been formally constituted and a critical mass of committed members has been engaged in both groups, ensuring a great potential to get valuable feedback at critical project stages while keeping a manageable size at the same time. At this moment, fourteen people from eleven stakeholder entities have joined the SAB using a signed LoI showing their willingness to participate. Also, thirty people from twenty-four organizations who have participated in any event organised by the consortium or at least have shown interest in the project have become part of the ISG.

A great effort has been made by project partners to identify these new SAB and ISG members. Contact has been established with such entities through face-to-face meeting or phone calls to let them know about the project objectives, expected results and collaboration mechanisms available to provide their feedback. Nineteen bilateral contacts (either F2F or via phone call) have been made with representatives from eighteen organizations located in five different countries. As a result, nine new members joined the SAB and nineteen new members joined the ISG.

In addition, three workshops have been held in Güssing, Bilbao and Algarve to foster awareness on SHAR-Q benefits among the stakeholder community and promote a fruitful discussion on the challenges ahead. As a result, nine new members joined the ISG.

SAB and ISG members are regularly updated on the project progress and achievements through a set of communication channels and activities, which have been defined and scheduled according to the SHAR-Q Dissemination and Communication Plan.

Project information has been continuously updated and released at the SHAR-Q website and social media. In addition, stakeholders belonging to the SAB and ISG have been given privileged access to specific project documents. A project newsletter has been delivered to SAB and ISG members by email every six months and a webinar focused on SHAR-Q business cases has been held.

Towards the second project year, the partners will not reduce their activities addressed to stakeholder engagement, even though the target KPI values are close. The goal is to continue improving the results so that in the second stage the objectives established for the end of the project are achieved.

For that purpose, specific action lines have been planned to strengthen the SHAR-Q stakeholder engagement strategy through the definition of collaboration mechanisms with related projects, an increased presence in clustering events, a sustained pace of contacts and F2F meetings with stakeholders and an additional effort to bring in stakeholders from the regions where the pilots are to be deployed.

Thank you @all stakeholders involved in SHAR-Q activities for this fruitful 1st project year!