Europe State of Mind: A Perspective on a More Connected Europe
Every autumn, organisations across Europe start preparing their EU funding applications. Over the past ten years I've worked with EU-funded projects in
a variety of roles — concept development, proposal writing, project management, consortium building, communication, training, and proposal evaluation. That work has given me in-depth insights and a perspective I want to share in this article.
Funding as part of a bigger picture
I see EU projects as long-term strategic support — a sustainable pathway for companies and public organisations alike. Yes, developing a proposal takes time and effort. But when the approach is genuinely needs-based, long-term, and built around European collaboration, each project becomes part of something larger:
a roadmap that gradually strengthens an organisation's place in the European innovation scene.
The more I have worked with EU projects, the more I have come to see them as an expression of the European Union's founding principles: strengthening solidarity and improving the well-being of its peoples through cooperation across borders.
A proposal, viewed this way, isn't a one-off application. It's one step in a longer relationship with other European organisations that continues regardless of the outcome of any single call.
These collaborations have given me a deeper understanding of different cultures, economies and societies — a constant reminder that there is always another perspective worth listening to. I often notice that I think at a European scale, no matter what I do. I like to call it a Europe state of mind. For me, this has been one of the greatest values of EU projects: building relationships, exchanging knowledge, and developing a more resilient Europe together.
Starting From the Right Question
The practical implication is a sequencing problem. Most organisations search for funding before they have fully defined what they are trying to achieve. Given how fragmented and fast-moving the European funding landscape has become — dozens of programmes, hundreds of calls, changing priorities — this ordering creates predictable overwhelm.
A more productive starting point is a short set of internal questions, answered honestly before any call is opened:
What are we trying to achieve over the next two to five years?
What do we want to develop, test, or bring into practice?
What need or challenge are we addressing, and for whom?
Where could collaboration take us further than we could go alone?
What expertise do we already hold that would be valuable to others?
What expertise do we lack, and want to learn from others?
Once an organisation can answer them with clarity, identifying the right funding opportunity becomes much easier.
Understanding Impact
One important observation concerns impact, particularly societal impact. In many technically advanced projects, there is often a strong focus on describing the technology, methodology, or scientific approach in detail. What can sometimes receive less attention is explaining what changes because that innovation exists and how it creates value beyond the project itself. The concept of impact pathways invites us to think beyond the solution itself. A few questions to consider — whether you are working on an EU proposal or developing an innovation — are:
What measurable change will this solution create?
How will we know that the change has actually happened?
What changes in an industry and society after the solution is introduced?
How does the solution keep creating value once the project itself has ended?
Rethinking Communication
Another observation concerns communication, dissemination and exploitation. Those who have worked, for example, with Horizon Europe projects will be familiar with these concepts. While they are closely connected and often discussed together, they serve different purposes.
Communication creates awareness. Dissemination ensures that knowledge and results reach those who can benefit from them. Exploitation focuses on how results continue creating value long after the initial work has been completed.
What I have observed is that these concepts often become reduced to communication activities: publishing results on a website, posting on social media, organising events. These activities are important, but they represent only one part of a much broader journey. Long before the final results are ready, there are many opportunities to start building understanding, trust and relationships around the work.
Storytelling, for example, can reveal where the idea began: the unmet need a founder noticed, the question that kept a researcher searching for answers, or the experience of the people the innovation is intended to serve. As a result, others gain a deeper understanding of the urgency of the challenge, the thinking behind the solution and the people committed to addressing it.
Different stakeholder engagement formats can bring researchers, companies, policymakers, communities, future users and other stakeholders into the process from the very beginning. Instead of waiting until the end of a project, organisations can gradually build a European-scale community around the work while it is still evolving.
Closing note
Over the past years, through attending events and having conversations, I have heard the same message repeated again and again: we need to collaborate more, we need to connect more.
How do we achieve that?
By developing collaborations at the European level. By connecting with organisations, initiatives and professionals across Europe. By exchanging knowledge and experiences, and by learning from one another. These are all practical ways to begin. Whether those conversations grow into joint projects, research partnerships or something entirely different is another story. What matters is taking that first step beyond our own bubble. The European Union has created countless programmes, networks and opportunities that exist for exactly this purpose—to help us connect across countries, disciplines and organisations.
Looking back, some of my most valuable learning and collaborations have come from doing exactly that. Above all, it is the wonderful people I have met along the way—from Germany, Italy, France, Poland, Austria, Spain, Hungary, Greece and Portugal—who have opened up new perspectives and broadened my horizons. I am truly grateful for that.
