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4. Building partnerships: Lessons learned

Last updated: 29.06.02

Lessons learned
The Alliance has learned many valuable lessons in the course of its on-going capacity-building efforts in building partnerships. They can be divided into three main areas:

Training content

Partnership initiatives by NGOs need to be appropriate to the communities in which they work. Projects that are based in resource-poor settings and that become dependent on intensive financial support are very unlikely to be sustained. Instead, training efforts should stress that money is not the only thing to gain from partnerships, and should instead emphasise mobilising other types of resources – such as technical, political or “in-kind” support.

To improve the co-ordination and effectiveness of local and national responses to HIV/AIDS, training must specifically focus on relations among NGOs as well as relations between NGOs and other sectors.

Government and the media are not the only potential partners in responding to HIV/AIDS. Training should stress the need to target partnership building efforts to sectors that have not traditionally played a role, such as the church and the business community, as well as more traditional partners. Trainers should remind participants to be open-minded, and encourage them to reach out to new sectors.

Training should emphasise the need to be as specific as possible about targeting potential partners. Participants should name specific individuals or institutions, such as a local newspaper editor or factory, rather than general sectors, such as the media or the business community.

NGOs should see partnership building as a key function rather than an optional, extra task. Training should emphasise the need to integrate outreach efforts into an NGO’s overall strategy – as this will help them to ensure that programmatic and partnership activities are both working towards the same goal of responding to HIV/AIDS.

NGO support programmes should point out that working in partnership might be new not just to NGOs, but also to businesses, governments and churches. Training should therefore emphasise to NGOs that mutual understanding and trust need to be developed over time, and immediate results cannot always be achieved.

People sometimes have misconceptions about other sectors. For example, members of the business community may assume that NGOs approaching them are only looking for financial hand-outs. Training should challenge these misperceptions in a constructive way, and emphasise the need for finding common ground.

Training on partnerships work should specifically include attention to monitoring and evaluation, including support in the development of simple and practical quantitative and qualitative indicators to assess strengths and weaknesses and measure success.

Using visual participatory activities, such as mapping and timelines, are invaluable for engaging NGOs and demystifying the partnership building process. However, emphasis needs to be placed on the quality of the information, discussions and ideas that emerge, rather than on the quality or detail of the drawings.

Younger, less sophisticated NGOs tend to be open to support in building partnerships, while mature NGOs can be less receptive, feeling that they have less to learn. However, in practice, all NGOs can benefit—whether they are starting from scratch or simply fine-tuning long-standing initiatives.

Training should target people who can make maximum use of the new skills they gain and take the partnership building efforts forward in their organisations. Involving at least two representatives from each NGO, such as the Executive Director and a Programme Officer, helps participants reinforce each other’s efforts once a workshop is over. It also protects against lost knowledge should one person leave the organisation. Trainers should also encourage participants to make specific plans to share what they have learned with other colleagues, for example through techniques such as “echo seminars.”

Trainers should validate and build upon participants’ past experiences in building partnerships, while also helping them develop a more strategic approach to future efforts. To validate the experience of the more mature NGOs, for instance, they can be asked to train less experienced NGOs.

Inviting religious leaders to speak at training sessions, sending participants out to local radio stations, and finding other ways of actively involving other sectors does more than just help participants learn. By breaking down misconceptions and creating personal bonds, activities like these are themselves a means of building relationships – by dispelling myths and fostering collaboration.

While local organisations can offer the benefit of practical experience, regional and international resource people can sometimes offer broader expertise. Training sessions can benefit from using both types of facilitators and technical input - to take advantage of these complementary strengths.

Documenting the process and tools used is crucial. For example, workshop leaders can develop an information sheet describing each day’s key activities and give take-home copies to participants. Technical support providers should also encourage NGOs to find simple and interesting ways to make records while implementing their work – for example, through project diaries or photo reports.

Building NGOs’ capacity to create partnerships is an on-going process. A single workshop is not enough. Ideally, trainers should find a way to provide on-going support to NGOs in order to help their efforts to grow and flourish.

Programme developers should recognise the value of basic, generic tools that can form a framework for skills-building efforts in any context. However, they must also be ready to adapt rather than replicate both tools and programme strategies. Flexibility is key. Programme developers must respond to — and be seen to respond to — the perceived needs of each NGO and country setting.

Partnership building efforts can give NGO support programmes a non-controversial point of entry to working with NGOs. After building a relationship with them, the support programmes can gradually shift their efforts towards tackling more challenging areas, such as organisational development.

Helping NGOs learn how to build partnerships does not just further their responses to HIV/AIDS. The collaborations they form can also aid their on-going work on other aspects of community development.

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