The UN’s Top Job
A public communications campaign explaining how the UN selects its Secretary-General and building interest around the process.
Office of the President of the United Nations General AssemblyFebruary 2026 to present
Context and challenge
The Secretary-General is one of the United Nations’ most recognisable figures. The process used to select that person is much less familiar. It is long, procedural and only attracts this level of public attention once a decade.
I began working on the campaign before the interactive dialogues, the first major public stage after candidates had been nominated. The selection would unfold over several months, so the communications needed to connect its different stages and help audiences understand what was happening at each point.
The campaign served audiences with very different levels of familiarity with the process. Member States, journalists and civil society needed accurate and timely information. Wider audiences first needed an introduction to how the selection worked and why it mattered.
Equal treatment was another central requirement. Every candidate had to receive the same level of visibility across the campaign. This affected the wording, imagery, publishing schedule and amount of information provided. Interest could not be built around individual personalities. The process itself had to carry the story.
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My role
I led the campaign’s day-to-day editorial and creative development within the Office’s communications team.
I set the editorial sequence and developed the main concept for each stage. I managed the campaign across messaging, visual direction, video production, event promotion, live coverage and the materials shared with partner offices.
For every development, I decided what audiences needed to understand, which format would communicate it most clearly and how it fitted into the wider selection process.
I also developed the campaign’s visual identity. Much of the United Nations’ public communication uses familiar institutional colours and layouts. For the selection, I created a system that was visibly distinct while still belonging within the organisation’s wider identity.
The modular grid, typography and colour system gave the campaign a consistent appearance across several months. It could also adapt to developments that could not all be planned in advance, including nominations, candidate events and new participation opportunities.
The system was used across social media, video, event screens, print materials and partner assets. The same layout rules could accommodate explainers, candidate materials, interactive-dialogue holding slides and live-event coverage. They also supported equal treatment by giving every candidate the same space and visual prominence.
The editorial approach varied by platform. Instagram carried more explanation and visual storytelling for wider and younger audiences. X prioritised timely information for journalists and Member States. LinkedIn provided fuller institutional context.
Key decisions
Tell one story in stages
The interactive dialogues, town hall and later stages could easily have appeared as unrelated United Nations events. Audiences would then have needed to relearn the context each time. The campaign connected them as stages of one selection process. Each output located the audience within that process by explaining what had already happened, what the current moment involved and what would come next.
Use familiar language carefully
The language of job applications and interviews offered an immediate route into a formal institutional process. I developed the line “The world’s toughest job interview” as the main public hook for the interactive dialogues and later campaign moments. It made the selection easier to enter without replacing the procedural explanation. The hook attracted attention. The supporting captions, explainers and event information then set out how the process actually worked.
Keep the process at the centre
Candidate materials followed one visual system, and every candidate received the same amount of space and information. The wording avoided implying preference, ranking or momentum. This shifted the campaign’s focus away from judging individual candidates. Its central subject remained the selection itself: how the United Nations chooses its next Secretary-General, who takes part and where the process currently stands.
Build interest around real moments
The campaign ran alongside the Office’s wider programme of work. Maintaining the same level of activity for several months would have crowded out other priorities and reduced the impact of the most important stages. Publishing increased around nominations, interactive dialogues, participation deadlines and live events. During quieter periods, occasional explainers and updates kept the selection visible without creating content simply to maintain volume.
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Outcome
By the end of July 2026, content published through the Office’s own accounts had recorded more than 1.2 million views and impressions across Instagram, X and LinkedIn. That figure covers only content published through accounts owned by the Office. It excludes the reach generated by partner offices, Member States, media outlets and other United Nations channels. To support wider distribution, I provided partner offices with campaign messaging, adaptable assets and Trello boards where materials could be accessed and downloaded. United Nations Information Centres and other UN accounts translated and published campaign content in several languages, including Spanish and Portuguese. The campaign was amplified by SDG Action, UN Brazil, UN Caribbean, UN Europe, UN Geneva, UN India, United Nations Hindi, the United Nations Foundation, the UN Information Centre in Washington and UN Portuguese. Several of these channels have considerably larger audiences than the Office. Their analytics are not included in the reported figure.
The campaign also travelled beyond United Nations channels. Media outlets including Al Jazeera and Deutsche Welle used the “world’s toughest job interview” framing. Member States extended the campaign around the interactive dialogues and town hall through their own coverage, materials and reposting. The project remains ongoing. Final reach, engagement, participation and event figures will be added as the selection progresses. The strongest entry points were the ones that helped people locate themselves within the process. Once audiences understood who was involved, what stage had been reached and what would happen next, the selection became much easier to follow.
Credits Developed within the communications team at the Office of the President of the United Nations General Assembly. I led the campaign’s day-to-day editorial and creative development, including the editorial sequence, campaign concepts, messaging, visual identity, video production, event promotion, live coverage and partner materials.
