igor.razbornik Today I will tell you something unusual for Erasmus+ projects – about the story and the value and how these two fits into E+ projects. Since I use this technique, the approval rate on my projects increased a lot. And because I’m telling you about the value, I will show you at the end of this video the example, how to use this technique for your current E+ applications. Sounds fair?
The story and the value
First, let me tell you a story about the story.
If I prepare a Facebook post with mostly educational content, I get around 1500 views. But if I post a story, which provides immediate value, the view rate jumps up to 15 000 and more. That is ten times more! What is the reason behind that?
So why is the story and the value so important? Not just in posts, but in everyday life?
Reason for that is purely economical. Too much information makes us select what we really need.
So how is this selection working?
Because the story provides a bridge where the viewer can identify himself with the storyteller. They get connected, and the viewer is into what the storyteller is trying to provide. And he is providing value.
When you are telling a story, you need to tell it in a proper way.
There is already an existing frame of how to do that, which I call Hollywood script.
Hollywood because you can see it in every movie.
It consists of three parts: settings, a twist and a happy outcome.
Every story has a theme and two principal characters: the Villain and the Hero.
Here is how this relates to your application, how I am doing this:
The text for the project description needs to be structured in the same way.
In the beginning, I describe the current situation, the problem, following with the description of the needs and who is affected – this is your target group, could be one or more. In the end, I suggest my solution, how we mean to solve the problem.
So, these are the three parts which will tell the evaluator what is the situation now, and what is our vision, what we are going to contribute to solving the existing problem.
That’s Why I always emphasize that first, you need to prepare a vision after the project! The vision shows how much better the situation will be after approving and delivering the project.
Conclusion
Can you see now how this concept fits into the Erasmus+ project, specifically into the project description?
This part is a story, and this part is a value.
The villain represents our problem, why we are doing this project in the first place. And who is the hero? Our project and the solution.
It is essential to prepare the project description in this way, in the story, because this is the first thing that evaluator will read, and this is the first contact with your project. So it needs to be prepared very, very well. If you fail here, most probably your approval of the project will fail too.
