Geneva daze, Geneva nights

We had the IWG and ECB meetings in Geneva last week, and overall I think
most of us were very happy with the week. Certainly some key decisions
were taken, and there was a general sense of progress as we move into
the final stretch of ECB Phase 1. Now that the end is in sight for many
project and agency staff, we had renewed vigour and an opportunity to
reflect on how much we've achieved. I was anxious to remind everybody
that, while we on the inside only tend to see the difficulties, a lot of
other actors in the sector are looking at ECB as a significant
initiative demonstrating that collaboration is possible in this
fragmented sector. So far, so positive!

On the downside, there were a few grumbles along the way. In
particular, nobody seems convinced that the ECB project is engaging with
the IWG Principals - in fact, there isn't even consensus on the
relationship between the Principals and the project. Are they supposed
to be giving strategic guidance? Actively managing the project?
Working with their teams to ensure that project activities are
successfully implemented? It's probably a little of each of those, but
each of the Principals seems to take a different approach, which makes
things confusing. Hopefully in Phase 2 this will be more clearly
outlined, which should help everybody.

And finally, there was a group of 10 of us left on Friday night. We had
a good ECB evening out in Geneva, where I managed (after some effort) to
get everybody to a decent restaurant (thanks to Bogdan from InterPeace
for the recommendation!). For various reasons, all of us needed a
chance to wind down, and hopefully coffee and ice cream at Movenpick did
the trick!