In the beginning of June, the Green Talent project held its Annual General Meeting, taking place from the 3rd until the 4th entirely online.
On the first day of the meeting, the agenda covered a workshop session, led by Dr Michael Hanley, Ana Rodriguez, and Dr. Tadhg MacIntyre, all representatives of the Innovation Value Institute, who introduced the Monitoring, Evaluation and Impact Framework of the project. The session shed more light on the framework's theoretical underpinning, measurement architectures, the four constituent evaluation models and domains, reporting structure, data collection strategy, and partner roles and obligations. The workshop was especially valuable and concluded with an interactive session, allowing partners to provide their structured and detailed feedback. Later that day, another Executive Board (EB) meeting and International Advisory Board (IAB) meeting were organised, allowing partners to discuss internal topics and align on future tasks.
The second day of the Green Talent General Assembly continued with a session dedicated to WP presentations, offering a comprehensive overview of the progress and milestones achieved across the project so far. Project coordinator Dr. Mario Balzan set the stage with an introduction of the official agenda and outlined the project's key impact goals for the following year. From there, each Work Package leader took the floor to present their updates:
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WP1: Project Management & Coordination - The Ecostack Innovations team walked us through deliverables submitted to date, shedding more light on the quality and risk monitoring and the road ahead in terms of reporting, DMP updates and administrative milestones.
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WP2: Cross-Sectoral Roadmap for R&I Capacity - The Cyprus Institute presented the mapping workflow of biodiversity-climate R&I networks, emerging key evidence, and the progress on developing the needs assessment tool.
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WP3: Capacity Building & Training - The Open University of Cyprus gave a detailed presentation on the comprehensive R&I training programme on climate and biodiversity, highlighting its structure, the R&I Excellence modules, the R&I Support modules and quality assurance practices.
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WP4: Cross-Sectoral Green Talent Exchange - The University of Crete shared their progress made on career plan development for seconded staff, preparations for upcoming secondments, and the next steps in implementing return plans for secondees.
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WP5: Collaboration & Synergies through Pilots - Ecostack Innovations introduced each project Demonstration Hub, highlighted outcomes from the DemoHub workshops, and Pensoft Publishers concluded with a live interactive demo session on the newly launched Exchange Forum.
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WP6: Monitoring, Evaluation & Impact - The Innovation Value Institute at Maynooth University presented the M&E framework with next steps covering ethics approval, data collection instrument development and piloting, and governance and data-sharing protocols.
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WP7: Communication, Dissemination & Exploitation - Pensoft Publishers showcased the project's branding and website development, social media presence, and ongoing efforts in knowledge transfer.
The meeting finished with a round of short discussions, bringing together all partner institutions for a critical exchange of ideas and feedback. These two days were very productive and inspiring, and we are pleased to see what is to come next.
