European Telework Week 1997 - Information Day 18 April 1997
European Telework Week is the focal point of many activities that go on throughout the year promoting the understanding of Telework and its considered implementation. Many other activities seek to attract the attention of the public and the media alike, and a focusing of many activities into a single week enables participants to reinforce their message at several levels.
It was to support industry, administrations, and other interested organisations in their activities that DGXIII launched European Telework Week in 1995. Objectives are:
In both 1995 and 1996, ETW had over 30 events occurring across Europe, with interest generated in local, regional and national media. International focus enabled the events to benefit from additional public and media awareness, and thus reach broader audiences.
Common elements in 1995 and 1996 were the fact that organisations contributed, without extra funding from the European Commission, but supported by local, regional and/or national actors, using the opportunity of a focus in media attention, and support of the ETW Team in 1995 and ETD project in 1996 in terms of practical advice, co-ordination and information dissemination.
REGIS Business Centres generously provided a network of national hot-lines (one per Member State) in 1995 and Global Office Network did the same in 1996. A WEB site was available for information and for linking events, in 1995 provided by Management Technology Associates, and in 1996 by the European Telework Development initiative.
The political support of Mr. Bangemann, Commissioner of Industry and Telecommunications and of DGXIII were generally well appreciated.
There were however missed opportunities in these years, for instance the fact that the support team did not manage to incorporate offers for sponsorship made by enterprises at a European Level. For this year, some organisations already committed themselves to such contributions. The contributions will not compete with local sponsorship requests, but will be used to support Pan European initiatives such as the European Telework Award and the Endorsement Committee (see below).
Other possible gains can be made by the provision of a more professional organisation of event support, and media support, as well as a more effective measuring of results (of major importance to obtain support for future events), which is foreseen in the Plan for 1997.
For 1997, new incentives for debate are there. The European Commission has urged member states (White Book on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment, 1993; Action Plan towards the Information Society 1995) and citizens to take up the challenge of entering the Information Society in a way that will "bring prosperity for us all". With its recent Green paper on "Partnership for a New Organisation of Work" (April 1997) and the foreseen follow up of "People First: Working and Living in the Information Society" (expected shortly), the coherent overview presented in the Rolling Action Plan "Europe at the Forefront of the Global Information Society" and others, focused at more specific topics like intellectual property rights (IPR) and "Content" on the Internet, the Commission plays its part in exploring and responding to the challenge of better understanding the change that is upon us. ETW might well provide opportunities to translate those concepts from European level to local issues.
European Telework Week 1997 (3-10 November) will build on earlier experience, profit from awareness in the media, and have more support from European projects and European industry than the preceding telework weeks. It is up to the activists of today to join into that opportunity, and turn it into real gains.
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