Home | Co-operation and Partnerships (Summary)
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Initiating partnerships 
Informal contacts and soundings between decision-makers from the prospective partners are often a first step followed by flexible early discussions which seek opportunities to complement the objectives of all partners involved. The nature of the agreed collaboration should be defined in writing, recording goals and each partner's responsibilities. Among the issues to be considered are funding, facilities, time, personnel, audiences, marketing and the use of media. 

Mission statement
Once formalized, a partnership needs a mission statement, for example: 

• “to champion and support the sector's unique role in enhancing the cultural, social, educational and economic life of the region"

• “to modernise, revitalise and transform public libraries and to fully harness their potential for learning, for social inclusion, for creativity, and for economic and social regeneration”.

Key visible activities
Among the activities which give life and external visibility to a partnership and potentially increase its influence are:

• A Strategic Plan setting out of a number of strategic objectives. 

• Published Action Plans for specific periods of time. 

• Task Forces to carry out these Action Plans.

• Key Reports and documents to show the results of these Action Plans. 

The organisation and structure of co-operation partnerships
A partnership should be an accountable organization. Partnerships may have a formal legal status or legal personality such as registered company or registered charity. A partnership may often need a corporate identity, including a ‘brand name’ and logo etc. A partnership may itself decide to enter other partnerships as a corporate body.

Partnerships should operate with clear governance rules e.g. for board meetings and decision-making, for example see California Statewide Electronic Library Consortium Boards of Directors should be set up to represent the range of stakeholders involved and may be drawn, for example, from local authorities; political bodies or assemblies; the academic sector; independent organizations; and professional officers from public libraries, museums, and archives. The Board may also include observers from national and regional agencies and other bodies with an overall interest. 

Funding for partnerships can be sought from a variety of programmes

• core grants from national or regional funding programmes

• member subscriptions

• local authority support funds 

• generated income

• project funding from government initiative funds, European Social Funds and the RTD programme e.g. IST

In some cases to obtain further funding, the partnership may need to identify its own ‘match funding’.

Maintenance of successful partnerships
Several key issues need to be dealt with in sustaining a successful partnership:

• the library’s senior management and local authority should be committed to any partnership arrangement;

• a named individual of the appropriate status within each organisation should be responsible: high profile partnership projects may involve the highest level of management of the organisation;

• good mutual understanding of the partner organisations’ institutional cultures, remits and objectives;

• realistic expectations; 

• an exit strategy – an agreement to leave the partnership in certain circumstances, covering apportionment of assets and liabilities. There should be an agreed method of winding up the partnership once its work is completed.

FUTURE AGENDA

The effect of the development of digital technology is to make libraries and other institutions less and less insular and more mutually dependent. New models such as regional Cultural Service Centres may emerge to provide innovative applications, solutions and services for local cultural institutions 

The future of partnerships is closely linked to the future of funding. The exigencies of funding make partnerships desirable or essential for certain purposes: changes in the availability of funding or in the conditions attached to awards of funds affect the viability of consortia and partnerships. 

The legal and regulatory framework for partnerships and co-operation within which libraries and other cultural organisations operate needs to develop to take account of the fact that local authority services such as public libraries are no longer as self-sufficient as they were a few decades ago and are now participants in a worldwide network which involves the public, private and voluntary sectors.

Home | Co-operation and Partnerships (Summary)
Full Text: Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4