Bridge 5: Strengthening Cross-Sector Collaboration

Partnerships
82

What do you think holds companies back from deeper, more meaningful collaboration with other businesses, foundations, civil society or government?

As someone from outside of business, my guess is the following:

  • knowing who to collaborate with
  • concerns about privacy and possible criticisms of business activities from people outside
  • budget concerns if they are funding activities
  • different institutional ways of working e.g. timelines, priorities, types of output
  • different fundamental goals among partners (e.g. profits or not)
83

Thanks Katie, a few things I’ve seen having worked across sector:

  1. Corporate world: limitations on what can be said, and in some cases, those with the valuable experience maybe lower in the seniority chain are restricted with approval chains and lack empowerment.
  2. Across the board, I’ve seen a high desire to hold the work close to the chest, maybe to secure funding or be ‘the only ones’ that can do ‘x’… when really, I fail to believe that the pie isn’t big enough for all if people/organisations to add value, make business or funding.
  3. Realising that building trust and partnerships take time. There is no quick fix to my mind. Trust is truly invaluable and the work that needs to go into that, like with any relationship is imperative. So perhaps it’s more about less partnerships and building trust with the few deeply rather than shallow with the many…
1 Like
84

Question 3
In order to support long-term systemic change, you need a true systems approach - not rocket science, but hard to implement. It’s complicated, interconnected, and messy!

  1. Not assuming that we know everything! Our unconscious incompetence is rife!
  2. Design Thinking is critical - that is a core foundational element of what we do at Challenge Works, ensuring our prize/programme/fund designs are informed, contextual, and relevant.
  3. I think another really important consideration when looking at long-term systemic change is that there isn’t a silver bullet to achieve it - it’s about a collection (or system!) of solutions, interventions, engagements, partnerships that work together to create a value that is greater than the sum of their parts. That is a core principle of challenge prizes as an enabler for systemic change.
85

I work for CAP Youth Empowerment Institute, an organisation that trains vulnerable youth and supports them to secure opportunities for livelihood, mostly through entry level jobs or setting up small businesses. We use a model called Basic Employability Skills Training (BEST). There are many examples of cross sector collaboration in our model. The most powerful one is collaboration with Businesses, without which our model would not work. First, we try to understand the needs of Business and the challenges they face in accessing good quality, reliable, entry level workers. In turn we develop a program train the vulnerable youth to become the kind of employees that these businesses can hire.

We consider this an ‘enlightened self interest’ kind of collaboration. And it works! Businesses are able to grow by relying on the pipeline of trained and highly motivated youth whom we train through our model. On the other hand, by working with growing businesses we are able to reach and support even more vulnerable youth, which is our core mandate.

Over the past 15 years we have been able to reach and support 100,000+ youth and support them to enter the world of work - start on lifelong long careers or set up small business that grow by being supply chain partners to bigger businesses. We have built trust between us and the Businesses sector, even though we are broadly very different entities, to the point that many Businesses will even link us to their competitors so that we can connect our youth to them. In other words, they are willing to suppress the competitive instinct so that they can assist us help vulnerable young people. It is a powerful testimony to what meaningful cross sector collaboration can do.

86

Picking up on the value of TRUST
I find that people who play the power dynamics often have unvoiced fears and they seek to “protect” their interests against the perception of risk, whereas the risks are typically only existing in their heads,
When I am collaborating with partners, I describe TRUST as being both the FUEL and the LUBRICANT of high impact collaboration - the fuel because it energises good conversations, and the lubricant because it reduces the friction that wastes energy and destroys momentum.

87

Partnerships can move beyond short-term projects by adopting a systems change approach like Systemcraft, which helps actors understand the root causes of complex problems and identify where to intervene for lasting impact. It shifts the focus from isolated activities to long-term outcomes, aligning diverse partners around a shared vision, adaptive strategies, and continuous learning. By working collaboratively on the underlying conditions—not just the symptoms—partnerships can drive meaningful, systemic change. Learn more about Systemcraft.

88

Understanding your why (organisation/work) and their why (partner). If they are truly aligned, then I can’t see why the partnership would end - unless it’s been solved.

89

How can partnerships move beyond short-term projects to create long-term systemic change?

I agree that if a partnership is working well, it makes a lot of sense to make it longer term. That said, we should be ready to wrap up partnerships and collaborations when they are no longer needed. So being long-term is not the goal in itself, but longevity is prioritized when suitable.

Longer-term partnerships can be enabled by having long term funding in place - combined with support from leadership.

90

In Aotearoa New Zealand, most businesses are keen to engage with their communities, Many are stuck in ‘Charity Mode’ and so unsure of what partnership and cross-sector collaboration could look like, and how to enact it. It’s also fair to say the same paradigm exists in the non-profit and charitable sectors.

Relationship Brokers are a key way forward to help find and facilitate solutions and relationships.

2 Likes
91
  1. What Holds Companies Back from Deeper Collaboration?

Some key barriers to deeper, more systemic collaboration between businesses and peers, civil society, government, etc.:

Businesses aren’t cohesive entities — there are different forces constantly in tension: some part of the business genuinely trying to act responsibly, and others driven purely by price point and margin pressure.

Short-Term Business Logic Prevails
Especially in times of regulatory rollback and economic uncertainty, short-term priorities dominate. When countries like the US is totally changing the paradigm we operated under, and reduce their aid budgets, it reinforces a scarcity mindset and puts wind in the sails of internal naysayers. Meanwhile, change-makers have to justify ROI over resilience. That dynamic sidelines long-term, cross-sector strategies.

Internal Friction & Reporting Burdens
People trying to create change are often knee-deep in reporting. Compliance demands, ESG documentation, internal scorecards — all of it eats into their capacity to actually innovate. Transparency is important (I’d support regulation any day and reporting matters, I had high hopes for CSRD and CSDDD), but what we hear repeatedly is that ‘doers’ can barely breathe enough oxygen to test new ideas or partnerships.

Misalignment of Language & Incentives
Civil society talks in values and systems; corporates talk in metrics, risk, and competitive advantage. There’s a real gap in translation. If you want a business to step up, you have to work with the logic of its priorities — short- and long-term — and build initiatives that are commercially meaningful. I also wonder if more behavioural theory would help here: how to make it easier for businesses to do the right thing by people and environment. It sounds lazy and complacent, I am trying to be practical.

Confusion & Volatility in the World
Business priorities shift constantly even in the best of times. Add to that the current level of global confusion — think paradigm shifts in the US, the EU pulling back regulation — and you’ve got fertile ground for hesitation, inconsistency, and risk-aversion.

We need to align collaboration with tangible commercial drivers: talent retention, supply chain resilience, innovation, and market access. We need coalitions that make things simpler, not heavier. And we need to borrow a bit from behavioural theory — how do we make acting responsibly the default, not the exception?

1 Like
92
  • Concerns about divergent or even conflicting mindsets (e.g., profit and practicality on the side of businesses vs. social justice and inclusion on the side of NGOs). Throughout my career in inclusive market development, I have heard one too many NGO staff asking “why we are working with the private sector?”. “They are in it only for the profit”; “Why do we want to build a partnership with them… Why do we want to make them richer when we need to be working for the poor?”.
  • Divergent or conflicting objectives between companies and NGOs: The former have strong incentives to build barriers to entry to stay competitive and maximise profits, while the latter have strong incentives to “democratise” social and economic impacts through crowding in, which entails a reduction of barriers to entry by competitors.
  • Perceptions by businesses that NGOs’ and government’s procurement procedures being too slow or rigid.
  • NGOs’ requests for information from the businesses can be too admin-heavy and/or irrelevant.
  • When NGOs engage in partnerships with businesses (especially small and medium ones) and the NGOs provides grants to the businesses, they can push the businesses to adopt functions that are not part of their core objectives. I have seen cases where the NGO imposes monitoring systems that measure stuff that the business does not need or does not care about.
93

Great discussion!

I believe that there are several tenets (these are not meant to be exhaustive! :slight_smile: ) that are critical to successful cross-sector collaboration:

  • Develop a shared vocabulary and understand each others language; companies, NGOs and governments all have their own particular language; similar words might mean very different things and vice versa. This can lead to unnecessary misunderstanding and misalignment.
  • Focus on the rightsholder, their problem to be solved and their context; partnerships are often designed in (shiny) institutional offices and can become negotiations protecting the priorities and interests of each partner. By shifting the focus to the community and bringing in their voice and lived experiences it becomes easier to find common ground and identify the role that each organisation can play/ contribute to then actually create an impact. This might seem obvious, but often the blind spot in the room is not really knowing what the actual problems are on the ground nor what to do (collaboratively); solutions need to be co-created with the community in question as the foundation of the partnership.
  • Build trust and transparency; Understanding each other’s core business, competencies, and processes takes time and patience. Building relationships across people, functions and organisations is key to finding the complementary sweet spots so that the partnership becomes greater than the sum of its parts.
  • Stay true to your values: Sometimes values and purpose can get lost in the pursuit of a partnership, especially if there are power (funding) imbalances. Be honest to yourself and create principles or ‘red lines’ that are non-negotiable so that you know when to potentially pull the plug.
94

Magdalene Kariuki, Africa Practice

A Powerful Example of Cross-Sector Collaboration: collaborated with partners in the not-for-profit, funding and private sector players as well as government entities at both national and county levels to develop an investment framework for FP/MNCH in Kenya. As a result of the deep collaboration across different players, we were able to map out and categorise key issues preventing last mile access to FP/ MNCH services into ecosystem, localization, policy and financing. From the vast consultative sessions, we were able to provide an investment framework for a global philanthropic organisation informing their funding strategy for the next 5-7 years.

What made it work

  • Shared vision and interdependent goals
  • Strategic complementarity especially between the government entities and CSOs
  • Mutual respect and trust
1 Like
95

Working at The Prince’s Trust we organised a huge, live urban music event for 36,000 attendees.

Major brand sponsorship, media, music industry, community and business programme managers, were the key partners, levers, in creating a new stakeholder collaboration.

Whilst each stakeholder brought different skill sets, resource, reach, and economic capability, critical for short to long term success, was the shared value in wanting to reach, engage and empower ‘the hardest to reach’ young people audience.

Accept that different stakeholders will have different needs, and lens through which they see the ways of leveraging this value. Open discussion around this from the very beginning of the collaboration is key, what are everyone’s goals? What are the outcomes they want and need to achieve in order to make the collaboration as positively impactful, and sustainable as possible?

Shared values, ambition, and aspiration is great, but its essential to also be pragmatic : identify the opportunity AND the risks from the start, and regularly come back to these for frequent 'health checks. It’s better to iterate as you go along, than avoid ‘awkward’ conversations which may jeopardise outcomes the longer they go unsaid . This is key to long term success.

Also select a 'Chair/ leadership for the group who has the right skills to optimise outcomes for the ‘collective’ , and steer you through choppy waters.

96

Hello everyone. Honored to be a part of this important discussion.
My name is Jen Faucon and I work with The USCIB Foundation. We are the supporting foundation of the US Council for International Business (USCIB) https://uscib.org/

We work extensively on the role of US Business in the multilateral system. We have seen significant progress in the growing important role of business in supporting social change.

Over the last year, we have worked across the business community and the multilateral system to develop the Business Pact for the Future. This was in response to the UN’s Pact for the Future https://www.un.org/en/summit-of-the-future/pact-for-the-future. You can read our roundtable reports and the pact itself on our website: Sustainable Development: Business Pact for the Future | USCF | The USCIB Foundation, Inc.

1 Like
97

Hello everyone, looking forward to participating in today’s discussion! Happy to connect with anyone interested in following up or exploring collaboration. You can find me here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susan-myers-2305698/

98
  1. I’ve been working to accelerate climate mitigation and resilience solutions for over two decades. Over that time, and especially with the climate crisis worsening, it is imperative that there is cross sector collaboration. When the private industry works in partnership with subnational and national governments and civil society that powerful finding models can be unlocked, practical policies are formulated and there is mutual benefit rather than perverse consequences occurring when any one stakeholder acts alone.

When multinational companies and their supply chains operate in geographies all across the world, a cookie cutter approach is not efficient and can cause harm. I’ll use biomass as an example. Some manufacturers have substituted fossil fuels with biomass as the fuel in burners. While this has achieved lower greenhouse gas and other harmful emissions, it has resulted in perverse consequences in some localities. Without working with local communities and local governments, the source of biomass can be harmful in that it can take from resources valuable to Indigenous communities or take from what some ranchers use as feed for cattle.

The combination of public, private and philanthropic funding is also a powerful capital stack that can be achieved for the benefit of all stakeholders when developed collaboratively.

  1. In my experience, companies are held back from deeper collaboration for a number of reasons: 1. Fear of losing competitive edge- some companies want full credit or be the first for innovative solutions. This is understandable to a degree but partnerships usually result in more pragmatic and systemic results. 2. Fear of being overly scrutinized. When companies make their solutions more public and in more collaboration then there is greater risk, including of being accused of not doing enough. 3. Fear of backlash. Out of the stakeholders listed in the question, if a collaboration goes wrong, it is often the company that is blamed. 4. Different incentives. When various stakeholders have different motivations and incentives and desired outcomes than a collaboration can seem hard. It is overcoming these barriers where the powerful solutions are realized.

  2. Partnerships should overcome short term projects to create long term systemic change. The costs of building a partnership are high and trust develops over time so systemic change can only occur over a long term and built off the foundation of shorter term projects. The trust that builds over time is key for realizing systemic change but also in being able to achieve outcomes for each stakeholder. Over time incentives such as profit, social impacts, minimizing risk are mutually beneficial. KPIs and MEL models evolve so there is mutual benefit and better results for all.

2 Likes
99

A critical issue that hold companies back from more meaningful collaboration is the recognition that different partners have different objectives.

While most experts state that all partners need to have the same objectives to collaborate, I would disagree with that completely. Different partners have different objectives. But can all agree to a project and its expected outcomes.

Governments, NGOs and Business would all have different reasons for wanting to build roads and bridges, for example, in an emerging market. Expecting all parties to have the same objectives - and reasons for participating - is often what holds up development and doesn’t lead to collaboration and implementation.

And I wholeheartedly agree with others in this discussion that TRUST and TRANSPARENCY is critical. Discussing and agreeing to different objectives would lead to trust and transparency and focus more on process and outcomes.

1 Like
100

There is a second critical reason for challenges in meaningful collaboration - business, foundations, civil society and government all “speak different languages.” And in fact different industries within the business sector “speak different languages.”

Governments and NGOs are focused on “managing risk.” Business is focused on “moving forward” and (often) taking strategic risk. To co-collaborate, partners must agree to a common language, a common way to organize a project, a common way to manage implementation, roles & responsibilities - and agree to “speed of work.”

This is a critical part of the early stage of development and where projects often stall. In business, we call it “form, storm and norm” for new team development. And if all parties do not understand that this is a “new way of working” it is challenging to get projects off the ground, organized and implemented.

1 Like
101

Hi all. I’m Jake White - Global Director of Partnerships & Corporate Fundraising at Street Child - we’re thrilled to be part of the discussion today.

Founded in Sierra Leone in 2008, Street Child now works in over 20 of the world’s poorest and most disaster-affected countries, including Afghanistan, Ukraine and Somalia.

Street Child works to address all the barriers which prevent a child from being safe, in school and learning. We provide emergency aid and mental health support, build schools, train teachers, reunite families, develop livelihoods and help out-of-school children into education.