Partnership brokering

Overview
In this context, the term ‘partnership’ is taken to mean a multi-stakeholder working relationship for those working together to improve social, cultural, economic and environmental outcomes (see Sustainable Development Goals). Such partnerships can be intra-sectoral (within one sector - for example, several non-governmental organisations working together) or inter-sectoral (any combination of business, government, international agencies, academic institutions, donors, non-profit and community-based entities) in nature. See also article on Type II partnerships.
A partnership broker can be described as an individual working either from within one of the partner organisations or as an external specialist brought in for specific partnership brokering roles or tasks.
“A partnership broker is an active ‘go-between’ who supports partners in navigating their partnering journey by helping them to create a map, plan their route, choose their mode of transport and change direction when necessary.”
The term ‘partnership broker’ was first coined by Ros Tennyson in 2000 in the publication ‘The Guiding Hand: Brokering Partnership for Sustainable Development’, which was co-authored together with Luke E. Wilde.
Partnership brokers are viewed as professionals with specific skill sets and approaches, and partnership brokering is understood increasingly widely as a new vocation / profession. In some contexts, the term partnership ‘broker’ is problematic and other terms are used, for example: ‘intermediator’; ‘bridge-builder’; ‘process manager’; ‘connector’ or ‘animator’. What the person does is more important than what they are called, but sometimes naming the role is useful if it brings attention to the importance of good process management in effective partnering.
Sometimes individuals undertake partnership brokering without thinking of it as a distinctive role with a name, but rather out of a gut instinct that the partnering process needs to be nurtured and managed if the goals of the partnership and the ambitions of the partners are to be met.
Sometimes, whether formal or informal, the partnership brokering role is shared between several players. In either case, partnership brokers focus on building and strengthening a multi-stakeholder partnership / collaboration / consortium / coalition / alliance over time throughout its life cycle, to ensure it delivers highly impactful programmes of work as well as significant wider value to those involved and wider society. This may also include helping the individuals who represent the partner organisations, build their own capacity for managing the partnering process more effectively and efficiently.
Why is partnership brokering necessary?
“Successful sustainable development requires partnerships between governments, the private sector and civil society. These inclusive partnerships built upon principles and values, a shared vision, and shared goals that place people and the planet at the centre, are needed at the global, regional, national and local level.”
Yet multi-stakeholder partnering is not easy and many fall short of expectation and there is justified criticism of partnering both for not doing things differently enough and / or for not achieving higher levels of delivering sustainable outcomes. Some of the challenges multi-stakeholder partnerships are facing include:
* Investing insufficiently in building the structures needed to manage the complexity and challenges of working effectively across global, regional and national/local levels.
* Power imbalances in the governance and operation of the MSP, and exclusion or lack of meaningful participation of stakeholders, in particular local actors.
* Lack of shared measurement systems; weak monitoring and impact evaluation; insufficient focus on learning and knowledge-sharing.
The challenge in collaborating within complex networks, non-traditional alliances, consortia or partnerships, is to form robust engagement approaches that ensure efficiency, effectiveness and added value. The movement from the exploratory phase to project design, development and implementation should be as seamless and speedy as possible, without compromising the jointly agreed values, integrity or inclusivity of the partnership. Partnership brokering helps those involved to work in ways that bring:
Tasks of partnership brokering during a life cycle of a partnership
A partnership typically progresses through four stages over its duration.
Before agreeing to partner it goes through a scoping and building phase, in which partners explore and define what it is they want to achieve, why they want to be involved and how to best go about it.
After agreeing to partner, the collaboration would move into an implementation phase, which focuses on delivering projects and partnership outcomes.
This would be followed by measuring and reviewing outcomes as well as the partnering process to potentially revise approaches.
In its final stage, a partnership would typically work on sustaining the outcomes and deciding how to best move on.
The roles and tasks of partnership brokers change in the different phases, based on the question, what is needed next to help the partnership move forward. These roles and tasks can include but are not limited to the following:
SCOPING PHASE
* Scoping of the partnership’s potential
* Exploring drivers, expectations, and underlying interests
* Embedding principles of diversity, equity, openness, mutual benefit and courage
* Enabling partners to differentiate between their partnership and its projects
* Assisting partners to reach agreement
IMPLEMENTATION PHASE
* Securing partner commitments
* Co-creating appropriate governance arrangements
* Building partner capacities to strengthen and optimise the partnership
* Deepening organisational engagement
* Helping partners work through complex internal and external challenges
* Encouraging assessment of the partnership’s performance
* Enabling partners to explore new ways of transforming systems
REVIEWING PHASE
* Supporting partners in reviewing added value and effectiveness
* Helping partnerships to become more effective and efficient
* Building understanding of effective partnerships by encouraging partners to share their lesson learned
* Guiding partners to plan for sustaining outcomes and moving on
SUSTAINING OUTCOMES PHASE
* Exploring moving on options and supporting decisions
* Ensuring outcomes are able to be sustained / embedded / transferred / scaled
* Managing closure / moving on processes collaboratively
* Helping partners celebrate, learn from and share their partnership ‘story’
Partnership brokering is a combination of both ‘art’ and ‘science’ and it requires a number of skills and attributes to do it well.
The ‘art’ of partnership brokering requires:
* Insight, imagination and feeling
* Vision (of what may be possible)
* People skills
* Active listening
* Personal engagement
The ‘science’ of partnership brokering requires:
* Knowledge, analysis and thinking
* Understanding (of the past)
* Administrative skills
* Precise speaking
* Professional detachment
Further references
Peter M. Senge, C. Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jaworski, Betty Sue Flowers, Exploring Profound Change in People, Organizations, and Society - published by Nicholas Brealey Publishing
Robert E. Quinn, Building The Bridge As You Walk On It - A Guide for Leading Change - published by John Wiley
Ros Tennyson, L. Wilde, The Guiding Hand: Brokering Partnerships for Sustainable Development - published by UNSSC and IBLF, 2000
Ros Tennyson, The Brokering Guidebook: Navigating Effective Sustainable Development Partnerships - published by IBLF, 2005 ¬- available from www.thepartneringinitiative.org
Sam Kaner, Facilitator’s Guide to Participatory Decision-Making - published by Jossey-Bass
Database: The United Nations organises efforts and activities to accumulate relevant data around the SDGs; this data collection framework is developed by UN-DESA and the UN Global Compact, with support from the UN Office for Partnerships.
Report: Van Tulder, Rob, Seitanidi, May, Crane, Andrew and Brammer, Steve (2016). Enhancing the Impact of Cross-Sector Partnerships. Four Impact loops for Channelling Partnership Studies.
Report: Maas, K.E.H. (2009, December 02). . Erasmus University Rotterdam
Report: Caplan, K. .
Report: Evans, E., J. McMahon & K. Caplan. .
Report: The partnering logic of companies to develop a pro-active business case for sustainability, which combines intrinsic and extrinsic motives for engagement. See Van Tulder, Van Tilburg, Franken, Da Rosa (2014). Managing the transition to a sustainable enterprise, Earthscan
Report: An illustrated exploration into how contextual factors fundamentally affects partnering, based on first-hand practitioner experience. (2016, published by PBA - a PEP project)
Report:
Report: For a further elaboration of the collaborative partnering scale, see: Austin, Jim and Seitanidi, May (2015) [https://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?oibibs&cluster11755500087328629787&btnI1&hlen Creating value in non-profit-business collaborations: New thinking and practice], Jossey Bas.
Report: Two classic studies on why partnerships matter are: Huxham, C.; Creating Collaborative Advantage (1996), Sage; and J. Austin (2000) - the Collaborative Challenge. See also: R. van Tulder (2010). The Collaborative Paradigm, PrC.
Report: DCED (2013): . DCED Private Sector Development Synthesis Note: Development agencies are increasingly interested in partnering with businesses to support private sector development (PSD) in developing countries. But how can they avoid partnering with businesses that have negative environmental and social impacts, and that could damage their reputation in the public eye? Approaches vary considerably between agencies and this Note is an initial scoping of the criteria and mechanisms in use, as well as common challenges.
Report: DCED (2015) Practical Tools for management and implementation of partnerships and inclusive business projects. Focus is on infrastructure PPPs but lessons apply more broadly.
Report: UN Global Compact (2013) ; Building block 7: decide how to monitor and evaluate the partnership.
Tool: Tennyson, Ros et al, The Partnering Toolbook (2005, revised 2013)
Tool: Communication in and about partnerships, read Tennyson, R. et al: .
Tool: Millennium Institute tool for simulating integrated impacts of SDG indicators. Find out how investments in different SDGs affect the whole system.
Tool: The Better Evaluation initiative shares and generates information about options (methods or processes) and approaches to improve evaluations.
Tool: The Goldilocks website of Interventions for Poverty Action (IPA) and the Center for Effective Global Action gather lessons from more than a dozen non-profits and social businesses on how to successfully monitor and evaluate social programs.
http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/globalpartnerships/
http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/policy/untaskteam_undf/faqs.pdf
https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/partnerships.html
https://www.un.org/ecosoc/en/node/355639
https://www.un.org/ecosoc/sites/www.un.org.ecosoc/files/files/en/2016doc/partnership-forum-beisheim-simon.pdf
https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/1738Global%20Multistakeholder.pdf

Main Menu

See Also

Main Menu