Duurzaam Vandaag

Tone of Voice

The goal of the magazine for me was to create a written piece for young adults, like me, who live in the area and would want to know more about a possible future in a sustainable city. Smart Grid Helmond is also going to be a hybrid working place, which makes it interesting for people in the area. The piece learned me to write clearly, concretely and concisely, without fuss or too much explanation around anything (something that is nice in storytelling). The result is a powerful, informative mini-magazine with the goals of persuading, activating and inspiring.

Challenges

One of the challenges I faced when writing this article was finding information about the Smart Grid Helmond project. The project was still in its early stages, so there was not a lot of information available about it. I was able to find some information online, but I also had to reach out to the project team to get more information.

Another challenge I faced was writing about a topic that I was not familiar with. I had never written about smart technologies before, so I had to do a lot of research to learn about the topic. I also had to make sure that I was able to explain the topic in a way that would be understandable to a general audience.

Process

I wanted to conduct the interview with one of Brainport’s employees. The concrete plans and details could not be found on the Internet, so I thought it would be interesting to hear some more insides through a phone interview. That’s how I ended up getting Brainport Smart District’s communications manager on the phone: Shona Dittner.

Shona was able to tell me a lot about the idea behind the smart district, who they would like to target and was even interested in the final magazine.