From Transactional to Transformational Social Impact Partnerships, How Can We Partner More Effectively?

Partnerships
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Join us for a live written discussion, with a panel of experts to discuss transformational social impact partnerships and how we can partner more effectively.

Live Panel

Thursday 21 February 2019, 15:00- 16:00 GMT / 10:00- 11.00 EST. ADD TO CALENDAR

Background:

If we are to deliver on the Sustainable Development Goals, and defend progress already made, we must, all—business, civil society and government—partner more effectively and more deeply than ever - but how?

"If you’re a supplier you deliver something in a fixed period of time. A partnership is a win-win, where you both want to achieve a shared goal and you keep going to achieve this. It’s like one plus one equals three,” explained members of the Cargill Central American Team recently during an interview for the Building Transformational Partnerships research Business Fights Poverty, Cargill and CARE undertook.

Join this live online discussion, to explore why businesses, NGOs and others are looking at new ways to partner, deepen impact and make a difference. You will hear first hand accounts from practitioners, learn from their successes and their mistakes, deepen your insight into partnerships which are pushing the boundaries and increase your understanding of the opportunities delivering SDG #17 could bring to your business.

If you are part of a business, NGO or organisation looking to forge partnerships, deepen relationships and scale impact this discussion will give you practitioner insight into how to move from transactional, primarily philanthropic relationships to ones that genuinely draw on the capabilities, skills and resources of each partner - creating not only shared commitment to an ambitious outcome but lasting focus to ensure impact delivery.

Panel

Taryn Barclay, Senior Director, Strategic Partnerships and Stakeholder Relations, Cargill
Claire Hitchcock, Director, Community Partnerships, EMAP, GlaxoSmithKline
Norine Kennedy, Vice President, Strategic International Engagement, Energy & Environmental Affairs, USCIB
Joan Lundgren, Executive Director, Strategic Partnerships, CARE
Rebecca Middleton, Executive Director, Alliance to End Hunger, representing the SDG2 Advocacy Hub
Darian Stibbe, Executive Director, The Partnering Initiative
Richard Morgan, Head of Government Relations, Anglo American
Michael Michener, Vice President, Product Policy and Innovation, USCIB

Moderator: Katie Hyson, Director, Thought Leadership, Business Fights Poverty

Questions

  1. Why are transformational private sector – NGO partnerships so important, particularly in light of advancing the SDGs?

  2. What makes for a great transformational partnership and how do you get there? (top tips from practitioners)

  3. What are the lessons learnt and pitfalls to look out for in the pursuit of transformational partnerships?

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Thank you everyone for joining today’s Business Fights Poverty online written discussion.

Today we are exploring how partnerships can make more of a lasting impact. I would encourage everyone to get involved, ask your own questions, add your comments and insights.

To begin today, could I please ask each of the panellists to introduce themselves.

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Hi, this is Mike Michener, Vice President of Product Policy and Innovation with the United States Council for International Business. I coordinate policy on behalf of our members in the sectors of food and agriculture, health care, chemicals and metals, intellectual property and innovation, and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum.

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Hello, this is Rebecca Middleton. I am the Executive Director of the Alliance to End Hunger in Washington, DC, where we connect diverse organizations, including NGOs, private sector, faith-based organizations, and universities, to build the public and political will to end hunger. On this call I am representing the SDG2Advocacy Hub (sdg2advocacyhub.org), a global network hosted by the Alliance that brings together NGOs, agricultural networks, nutritionists, campaigners, civil society, the private sector, and UN agencies to coordinate advocacy efforts to achieve SDG2 by 2030.

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Hi this is Claire Hitchcock, I lead GSK’s Global Health Programmes. I oversee the design, creation and implementation of access to healthcare programmes in over 60 countries globally. This includes leadership of GSK’s flagship partnership with Save the Children which combines GSK’s scientific expertise with Save the Children’s on-the-ground knowledge and insights to find new ways to help reduce the number of children dying from preventable and treatable diseases.
I also lead GSK’s global strategy for humanitarian and emergency response, providing medicine donations, funding and resources wherever the need arises.

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Hi, this is Norine Kennedy - also at the United States Council for International Business and responsible for environment, energy and SDG work. I have been following the SDG and partnership journey since Rio in 1992 and looking forward to this morning’s exchange.

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Hello, This is Joan Lundgren, Executive Director of CARE USA’s Strategic Partnerships team. We lead CARE’s global engagements with US-based MNCs.

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Hi Richard Morgan here from Anglo American

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Hello this is Lukas Wank, Program Manager for Global Responsibility, the Austrian platform for development and humanitarian aid. There I am responsible for private sector engagement of our member organisations.
Looking fwd to the discussion!

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Hi everyone, thanks for joining us today! My name is Taryn Barclay and I am Senior Director for Strategic Partnerships & Stakeholder Engagement at Cargill. I am looking forward to sharing our more about our global partnership with CARE

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Our first question today:

Q1: Why are transformational private sector – NGO partnerships so important, particularly in light of advancing the SDGs?

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A1: Progress towards the ambitious 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is too slow and the scale and complexity of the problem underscores the need for deepened collaboration and renewed commitment to improving development outcomes for all, especially the most vulnerable. Countries cannot achieve their SDG goals without an aligned, motivated and incentivized private sector as a key partner. In this context, improved dialogue and collaboration between government, business, civil society and international organizations in the form of transformational partnerships, i.e. engagements beyond the normal transactional arrangement, are crucial for guiding engagement and focusing efforts where they can have the most sustainable impact and long-term success.
A1: An example of a transformational partnership would be my organization’s engagement with a Geneva-based NGO, the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN). We are organizations with very different missions – USCIB represents private sector views in the UN and other multilateral bodies while GAIN is an NGO focused on improved nutritional outcomes – but we saw an opportunity to advance a shared goal of encouraging more effective public-private partnerships in the area of nutrition. So we convened a discussion among our mutual stakeholders to see if we could come up with ways to do just that. In effect, we struck up a transformational partnership with GAIN in order to encourage more transformational partnerships!

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With 17 #SDGs to achieve in the next 11 years, we need all sectors working together in a deliberate and focused way to tackle these global. There are endless possibilities of aligning business strengths and development goals if we are all bringing a partnership mindset and our best assets to the table.

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CARE and Cargill’s nearly sixty-year relationship has evolved from a philanthropic to a strategic engagement. In the early 1960s, Cargill sent CARE packages to more than 1,000 families, hospitals, and orphanages around the world. Cargill continued philanthropically supporting CARE’s work through the decades until, in 2008, the we launched a global strategic partnership.

Initially a $10 million, 5-year commitment called the Rural Development Initiative, the global partnership sought to help 100,000 smallholder farmers increase their productivity and household income and address critical education and nutrition challenges among their communities. The partnership was renewed and expanded in 2013 and again in 2016.

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Hi all,

I’m Darian Stibbe, Executive Director of The Partnering Initiative. Delighted to be here!

For those that don’t know TPI, it’s an international NGO working for 15 years with multi-national companies, the UN, INGOs and governments to ‘unleash the power of partnership’ for sustainable development.

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Why are transformational partnerships so important for the SDGs? The SDGs represent a fundamental shift in thinking and approach. At their best, they represent a move away from linear, siloed development thinking towards the requirement for development of a society as whole. The SDGs are a manifestation of the interconnectedness of the prosperity of business, of the environment and of society and the essential role of all sectors as key development actors. They can only be achieved through collaboration across all society sectors and through much more holistic action across multiple areas in order to deliver real change.

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A1: Advancing the SDGs requires transformational change across society, on a multifaceted set of issues. It stands to reason that, in our diverse modern society, we are more likely to realise such broad and wide-reaching goals, if organisations in all sectors take accountability, and think and work together differently. Transformational private sector-NGO partnerships are one specific opportunity area for doing this.
From the business viewpoint, addressing the SDGs is important for long term growth. And private-sector NGO partnerships that go beyond corporate philanthropy offer the opportunity for businesses and NGOs to make better use of their respective expertise and resources, whilst creating a richer opportunity for innovation and creative problem solving in pursuing progress against the SDG agenda.

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Just building on Mike’s comment - partnerships are the epitome of inclusive multilateralism and the fact is the UN of today is no longer just an inter-governmental body reviewing a relatively narrow horizon as it was at its founding – it is taking on cross-cutting topics, engaging with societal partners, delivering new kinds of value to society – Partnerships are the bridges to innovation in the UN leveraging government and private sector resources.

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Partnerships are important as they take us out of improving on business as usual and into a wider world

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A1: Just a little more on what we accomplished in our partnership with GAIN: the GAIN and USCIB Principles of Engagement were developed at the first ‘Together for Nutrition’ event held in New York in October 2017, and they were then launched in Geneva in July 2018. The Principles offer a set of top line agreements and a possible framework for collaboration. Importantly, they do not require governments, organizations, institutions or bodies to formally “sign up” to them. Instead they are an optional platform that can be used to further public-private interaction where useful and serve as a way of grounding conversations on difficult issues.
A1: The seven Principles are Alignment, Prioritization, Impact, Data, Innovation, Accountability, and Inclusion. I can give you more information about any or all of the Principles – just ask if you are interested!
A1: Following the conclusion of the first meeting a number of recommendations were made to advance public-private engagement in pursuit of the global nutrition goals. One of the recommendations was to hold a follow up event in 2018 to further advance the dialogue. This second dialogue, held in Rome on 8-9 November 2018, focused on ways to implement and scale coordinated approached with a view to putting the Principles of Engagement into action.

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