Whether you’re working on a local collective impact initiative or a national public-private partnership; whether you’re a practitioner or a researcher; whether you’re looking for basics or a detailed look at a particular topic, our Resource Library can help you find the information and tools you need for your cross-sector thinking and practice. The Library — which includes resources from research organizations, advisory groups, training organizations, academic centers and journals, and other sources — spans issue areas, sectors, and partnership types.
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There are a number of academic courses, programs, and certificates offered in the United States in which cross-sector collaboration is a major theme. We hope this list will be useful for educators who are interested in how this topic is being taught at universities across the country…
In this paper, Living Cities offers “a strategic framework for cross-sector partnerships including describing and defining the traits that make up a strong foundation, factors that influence success, and behaviors of high-impact efforts. In addition to the theory, the paper steeps these ideas in four…
This landmark SSIR article introduced the concept of collective impact and its five conditions of collective success. “Collaboration is nothing new. The social sector is filled with examples of partnerships, networks, and other types of joint efforts. But collective impact initiatives are distinctly different. Unlike…
✴︎ Available only with purchase from publisher “Theoretical and empirical work on collaboration has proliferated in the last decade. The authors’ 2006 article on designing and implementing cross-sector collaborations was a part of, and helped stimulate, this growth. This article reviews the authors’ and others’…
“This report focuses specifically on a cross-sector collaborative effort to significantly reduce traffic congestion in the Twin Cities metropolitan area of Minnesota. The organizers of the program concluded that a collaborative, multi-modal approach was crucial to making real headway on a longstanding, costly, nearly intractable…
In 2005, the Indian state of Kerala banned the production of Coca-Cola products in the region, due to the company’s excessive use of water and poor record of pollution. It was clear to Coca-Cola that the corporation could improve its water efficiency and overall water…
This podcast from SSIR features interviews with Gwen Ruta, who directs the Environmental Defense Fund’s Corporate Partnerships program, and Bob Langert, Vice President of Corporate Social Responsibility at McDonald’s. Ruta and Langert discuss cross-sector partnerships in environmental and social innovation that stemmed from the partnership…
This resource includes guidance for non-profit and for-profit organizations looking to enter into a “mutually beneficial and well-defined relationship … to achieve common goals” and includes sections related to: Choosing the optimal level of “intensity” (from cooperation to collaboration to integration) for a new partnership…
“Non-profits and corporations can achieve their goals by working together. In this panel discussion, 2007 Nonprofit Boot Camp panelists describe the various forms of partnerships between non-profit and for-profit organizations, their benefits, and their pitfalls. They talk about how to start and develop successful partnerships…
“In this paper, we examine the drivers involved in an alternative business model: cross-sector social partnerships (CSSPs) between for-profit, predominantly multinational corporations (MNCs) and nonprofit organizations (NPOs). We explore these cross-sector social partnerships (CSSPs) from the perspective of these primary stakeholders, examining the questions of…
“The sustainable development agenda is placing increasing expectations on business and cross‐sector partnerships. One of the rising propositions is that companies and non‐governmental organizations (NGOs) can co‐create inclusive business ventures that are simultaneously both profitable and poverty reducing. A considerable number of studies have found…
✴︎ Available only with purchase from publisher “Nowadays, a significant portion of corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication takes place online. The current article attends to an essential, yet often overlooked element of online CSR communication: cross-sectoral hyperlink networks. The article argues that corporations build cross-sectoral…
“One of the fastest-growing corporate citizenship programs is skills-based volunteering — in which a team of corporate employees works for an extended period of time to help a nonprofit solve a complex operational problem,” write Christine Letts and Danielle Holly in SSIR. “Given the fact…
✴︎ Available only with purchase from publisher “We analyse business-NGO (B2N) alliances through the lenses of multiple agency and behavioural agency theories to identify the sources of agency problems and the most effective choice of mitigation mechanisms. We contend that three types of agency relationships…
“One challenge that arises in cross-sector partnerships is the set of practical governance tools available to each of the partners, which we argue differ significantly across sectors,” write Carlos Rufin and Miguel Rivera-Santos in this blog post for The Intersector Project. They detail the unconventional…