Harnessing the power of collaboration and partnerships.
Few people have time to read and digest academic literature – but a clear concept or idea can steady, reassure and guide an organisation that is trying something new. Here are a few that, over the years, we have used again and again.
The management of collaboration requires a distinctive set of specialist competencies. These include: the ability to discern how organisations interact with their environments and stakeholders; the willingness to see collaboration as a long-term developmental process rather than a one-off task; the recognition of the emotional elements involved in the process; and the skill to act as an intermediary and build trust across organisational boundaries.
The collaboration process can move more smoothly when parties are able to visualise the process as a form of ‘exchange’, in which all parties need to give up some cherished beliefs and practices in order to gain the benefits they seek for their clients and organisations in the longer term. This was particularly the case where study participants saw themselves as engaged in a struggle for supremacy: progress was often made when the process was re-framed as being more of an exchange which could yield benefits to all parties, irrespective of sector or organisational size.
Because the practical challenges of collaboration can be formidable, and the process can extend over a long time period, the management of collaboration involves motivating paid staff, volunteers, trustees and other stakeholders to make special efforts to contribute positively to the enactment and embedding of change. This is especially the case where there is a strong sense of loss among some stakeholders or a lack of understanding of the compensatory benefits that might accrue from collaboration. It follows that it can be helpful if the potential collaborative advantage is clearly articulated to all stakeholders at an early stage of a collaborative process. Those whose full cooperation is required to enact and sustain organisational change need to be able to see the added value for themselves and others which can result from cooperation and the abandonment or modification of former working norms and cultures.
With thanks to Oasis Cardiff, Paul Coleman/Eden Project Communities and Peckham Big Lunch for the photos used on this page.