What constitutes a ‘result’ in terms of partnering effectiveness and impact?
Each partnership will have its mechanisms in place for measuring the results of their projects and programmes of work. This is standard programme management. But what of the partnership itself – what has been the added value and wider outcomes from engaging in a collaborative approach. This is relatively new territory.
The focus here is on how best the partners can best work to optimise the value of their partnership and strive for wider outcomes and impact.
One place to start is to embed a number of core principles (perhaps especially important when working remotely) that will push partners into more thoughtful and inclusive ways of working.
Download:
Embedding Partnering Principles (when working remotely) (pdf)
In his paper Bridges, Walls and a Collaboration Ladder, Jean-Louis Lambeau uses a ‘collaborative ladder’ exercise to push partnerships to the achievement of more ambitious goals and suggests that partner strive to:
- Make sense collectively of the core notion of collaboration
- Reflect in the light the concrete experience of local networks, teams and partnerships
- Indicate potential for progression, and in the longer run, monitoring those progressions and
- Open a debate on the processes at play
This is interesting and aligns with the experiences and aspirations of other practitioners. One issue, however, that is often absent in the literature and research into partnering is the issue of leadership (see Getting Beyond for more on this).
Download:
Leading Change Checklist(pdf)
Leading Change Checklist (word)
Another lens on what helps to achieve results from a partnering mechanism comes from the authors of Walking into the Whirlwind: The Case for Collaboration in Disaster Management (see below). They identify five central factors in collaborating effectivenely as they reflect on the response to Typhoon Haiyan (known locally as Typhoon Yolanda). These are:
- Efficiency
- Getting behind a purpose
- Reimagining power relations
- Harnessing social capital
- Change from within, change from without
It is clear that partnering takes effort, intention and a systematic approach to the partnering process if it is to really achieve the results the world needs.
Download:
Critical Success Factors for Remote Partnering (pdf)
Creating a Vision for Remote Partnering
In an effective remote partnering system, partners get beyond the disadvantages and explore new ways of working together long-distance that give space for understanding each other’s constraints and building opportunities for innovation and breakthrough. They operate in a principled way though giving and receiving feedback, exploring how to work well together and being prepared to challenge and to change.
Diversity and distance become productive, as the separation gives time for individual reflection, imagination and re-framing that leads to new insights and collective action.
Within the partnership, each partner can work at their own pace, according to their own capabilities, whilst focusing on the needs of their communities and supporting the needs of others.
Sharing this common thread of connectedness and consciousness, each partner feels genuinely empowered to weave an original story, embedded within the local culture, history and environment, that enables themselves and their community to evolve context-appropriate ways of doing new things.Source: Design Lab – January 2017
Remote Partnering Project
Building a realistic-yet-ambitious vision for partnering and any other forms of multi-stakeholder collaboration is the purpose of this online Defying Distance Tool Box. It is a work in progress and all new contributions will be welcome. There is a great deal to be done, we are still in the early stages of understanding the challenges and potential of partnering for the sustainability of our planet.
We cannot be smug – there is no room at all for complacency
The Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the International Panel on Climate Change paints a grim picture of alarming sea level rise and more violent (though less frequent) storms in the Philippines. Food security, public health, shelter, livelihoods – all will take a beating if governments and communities do not actively reduce the risks of disasters and adapt to climate change.Maboloc, M & Tanyang, G
Walking into the Whirlwind: The Case for Collaboration in Disaster Management