The world is facing a growing water crisis that is closely linked to humanity’s most pressing challenges. The Stockholm International Water Institute, SIWI, works globally to change how water is understood, valued and managed. As an advocate and advisor, SIWI demonstrates how improved water management is the key to a fairer, more prosperous and resilient future.
SIWI is a large organization and their work is global. They had 18 websites for different projects, which was a huge challenge and expensive to maintain and manage, and a nightmare for the communications team. They also have a diverse range of stakeholders, from government institutions to private researchers and water experts. World Water Week, an annual event organized by SIWI, brings together more than 4000 participants from around the world to discuss global water issues. The World Water Week conference lifecycle includes soliciting proposals from organizations around the world, evaluating them, and selecting speakers for the conference itself, the conference program, and follow-up communications. The management relied heavily on a few web forms and emailed spreadsheets.
Understanding users and stakeholders is crucial to developing a complex web solution. We held a series of workshops to better understand the different use cases and capture ideas from both internal and external stakeholders.
We created a clickable prototype that enabled SIWI to test the solution early with a focus group and gain a better understanding of the users.
We worked with the World Water Week team to create a process flow chart from the beginning of the conference planning to the conference itself and the communication afterwards. We also spoke with the key people responsible for managing the website to ensure that the new platform would solve their problems and make the planning and execution of the conference much easier.
All of SIWI’s activities and programs are now gathered on a single website on a new digital platform – Siwi.org. Articles and information can be easily shared between the main website and microsites. This reduces administration and allows even small projects to have a professional website, while large projects can have extensive subsites.
World Water Week now has a complete conference management tool built specifically for their process and needs. Spreadsheets are no longer sent out via email. Instead, there is a robust system for accepting, organizing and evaluating proposals, creating schedules, and managing everything before and after the conference.