NGEurope: Promoting European social cohesion through leadership and change engagement by NGOs

The importance of the third sector (or social sector) not only at an economic level but also for the promotion of more resilient and sustainable communities is very much recognized worldwide and the EU, in particular, has been very supportive of this sector and made a significant effort to monitor, evaluate and quantify its impact in Europe. The level of impact of the social sector in a certain country or community is visible when we look at the levels of civic participation of that community, their well-being and empowerment. A good and functional social sector can even mean an increase of job opportunities within a certain community. This is true mainly because NGOs and other social sector’ entities, are able to respond to issues within the community (environmental, social, cultural, sportive, etc) in a an effective, fast, autonomous and personalised way. Many of these entities are local and work in close proximity with the community which allows them to deeply understand the problems and to find comprehensive solutions, which is something that public institutions and governmental agencies may struggle to do whether for bureaucratic reasons or lack of practical understanding about the community’s dynamics, problems and people.However, there is a discrepancy amongst European countries in the recognition and valorization of the third sector as an important sector both at an economic and sociological levels. There is a generalised need for more and better civic participation. NGEurope comes from the necessity of raising awareness for the importance of the work developed by NGOs and other third sector entities in Europe and from the need to act and to take responsibility for common issues, mainly at environmental and social levels. The main objective of NGEurope is to capacitate a new generation of community leaders and support NGOs that already exist by sharing success stories and role models throughout Europe as examples of good, replicable practices.Nine intellectual outputs were developed within NGEurope, all of which are accessible in the project’s online platform (www.ngeurope.net). The consortium started with an in-depth diagnostic analysis of the public perception of the third sector in the five partner countries (Portugal, Ireland, Spain, Austria and Greece) that helped shape and adapt all remaining outputs. In the online platform, there is an Observatory that showcases real, successful and replicable examples of NGOs across Europe. NGEurope also developed a training course package on social and green leadership and the courseware is all available online. One of the most successful outputs of this project was IO7 – the survival guide for funding and founding an ONG – a very helpful document for those starting in the third sector. Six multiplier events, one in each partner country and one online, were organized, and around 270 people participated and 30 NGOs presented their work to the audiences. From these events, multiple new partnerships arose and some of them even resulted in other funded projects. Five editions of the training course were organized where 95 trainees were able to learn about leadership, social and green entrepreneurship, NGO management, among other topics. NGEurope also promoted an immersion “job shadowing” program where mentees went to an NGO of their choice to learn about the day-to-day management, the invisible work NGOs do to create impact in their communities and be inspired to be more active. 83 successful programs were done.NGEurope reached an audience of more than 2,5 million people between direct and indirect dissemination actions (project-related events, presentations at conferences and seminars, interviews in the media, social media, websites, among others) and was directly responsible for some job opportunities, new civic movements creation and fruitful new partnerships.