Ask the "How" and "When" Questions
Key Messages: Identify two to four key messages for your campaign - messages that clearly define the problem and suggest a solution. Communicate those messages in a way that is accessible to the public and that can penetrate the media. Be sure that everyone working on your campaign understands the key messages and is prepared to repeat them.Strategy: The strategy is the general plan for organizing your power to achieve your goals. For example you might decide to have a grassroots lobbying campaign, a boycott, a two-year public education campaign or focus your effort entirely on quiet inside work with a small group of legislators. Set your initial strategy based on a power analysis of the relative strength of the various forces in your campaign.
Tactics: Tactics are the best approaches to make your power felt in order to influence decision-makers, mobilize your base or affect public opinion. Tactics include such things as building coalitions, holding public demonstrations, engaging in civil disobedience, etc.
Activities: Activities are the specific and concrete actions your campaign will carry out to meet the tactical and strategic objectives (e.g. gather 500 signatures on a petition, host 15 house parties, turn out 20 people at each committee hearing, etc.) For each activity you need to decide 1) who is responsible to make it happen and 2) when it will happen. Organizational Structure: How will you organize yourself to carry out the work and make decisions? What is the role of the staff, volunteers, board members and others in ensuring that the work gets done?
Budget and Resources: What resources, including money, in-kind donations, skills and talents are needed to make sure you are successful? How will you get them?
Timeline: Always build your timeline from the end point moving backward. For example, if the crucial vote of the Education Finance Committee will take place on May 1 and a majority of that committee must be supporting you at that time, what needs to happen between now and then to be able to win?
Evaluation: Please remember - you are not done, even if you won, until you evaluate the experience, noting the things that went well and those that did not and summarizing the information. Far too much wisdom, data and experience is lost by those who don't take this final step. Let's all do a better job of sharing the lessons learned, not only with those who worked on an issue or campaign, but those who might be attempting a similar project in the future. We often can learn as much from our failed attempts as we can from what worked. Nothing is every completely smooth or flawless so be honest and commit to doing it even better the next time.