Literacy Basics - Employment Ontario

What is a Partnership?

Partnerships can take on many forms. They can be very formal arrangements that are arrived at after a series of negotiations, with specific roles and responsibilities for each partner described in detail in a written document. Partnerships can also be very informal arrangements where two or more organizations agree to work together in some manner. Many partnerships, however, fall somewhere between these two extremes, i.e. there is an agreement to work together, and there are some details about who will be doing what that may or may not be written down. Partnerships can be collaborations, cooperative agreements or coordinated efforts. For the purposes of simplicity, this document will just use the term “partnership”.

Whatever form they take, partnerships should be mutually beneficial, to the organizations involved, there should be shared responsibility (that does not mean that it needs to be an equal sharing, but there should be agreement as to who does what). Often, partnerships come about because of an identified need that cannot be met by one organization working on its own.

Partnerships do not just happen. They need to be initiated, developed and nurtured.

Good Resources

The Partnership Handbook by Flo Frank and Anne Smith for the Labour Market Learning and Development Unit, Human Resources Development Canada, 2000. This is an excellent resource that includes virtually everything you need to know about partnerships.

Establishing Partnerships by the Compassion Capital Fund.

Joint Ventures: The Promise, Power and Performance of Partnering from the California State Library.

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