Our digital home has a new look to it. Following the publication of our 2016-2021 strategic framework, our old website no longer reflected our new ways of working, our priorities and our expertise. The new website opens up space for new topics and activities we have been exploring since 2016, such as our campaign on sustainable lifestyles and our work on energy policy. The website has been redesigned based on feedback from our members and their communications staff, and will better respond to their needs while incorporating our collective envisioning of our identity as an organisation.
The new website is a clearer portrait of CIDSE. The structure of the menu is intended to break down a presentation of us into three essentials: What (Our areas of work), How (acting for change), and Who we are. Our ‘why’, our nature and culture as an organisation, is in the underlying tone of the design: caring, approachable, serving a community of social justice.
CIDSE’s systemic approach was a key principle for the redesign. Rather than cutting work into strict silos, the display of material on the areas of work pages now better illustrates the interlinkage between our working areas and the joint projects they are pursuing. The areas of work remain represented with their focused positions, and their pursuits and collaborations are on show. The content produced in our areas of work is divided by the kind of material, either stories (encompassing blogs, videos, graphics and other creative material) or publications (policy papers, reports, studies and statements other informational material).
The acting for change pages shed light on the three roles of CIDSE, as elaborated in our operational plan under the 2016 strategic framework. The connecting page will feature the material we have created to support social movements, and to connect different actors with civil society to exchange knowledge. The influencing page displays our direct advocacy work, the material used to influence decision makers and other targeted communities. The storytelling page displays the creative multimedia we have produced to change the dominant narratives and rhetoric in society, and to spread hopeful stories of change.
But these pages are meant to display the latest activities. All past material and news will be more easy to find in the library, a new feature we have developed based exactly on the concern expressed by members on the difficulty to find resources on the previous website. The library has clear categories under our new tagging system to make it simple to find and discover materials. And if all else fails, our search bar is now more effective.
We were concerned with improving the usefulness of the website for members, and accordingly we now have a fresh interactive map to better display where our members our active, and tags for each member to make it easier to find what projects and initiatives each member has directly worked on.
The website now has a plug in to offer automatic translations of all pages. The languages were chosen based on the use of the language in the global South and North, and how frequently our previous website received users from that language or nation. We will continue to professionally translate some publications on a case by case basis, as we always have. The automatic translations are not perfect, and we are currently commissioning professional translations of all of the static pages.
This website can grow with us. Thanks to flexible new software, we intend to continue to explore it’s possibilities in the years to come, based on our development as an organisation. Your response, as a member of our community and our audience, will be invaluable to make sure this tool is refined to our needs. We welcome you to give your comments and reactions below.