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…
This detailed article from the Harvard Business Review describes new ways to reinvent the transportation infrastructure and innovate new leaders that build connections across companies, industries, and sectors. “There is one best way to get big projects done. It has nothing to do with the…
“Cross-sector partnerships across the country are working hard to achieve collective impact. Although public policymakers often share the goals of these partnerships, federal, state, and local policies too often impede rather than enhance the conditions necessary to operate collectively. Worse, some public policies explicitly prohibit…
Writing in SSIR, Ken Thompson explains, “I’m hearing some similar things from a variety of people doing collective impact work, and I think they’re worth calling out. My thoughts here focus on whether funders are — or could be — playing roles that help collective…
“On the one hand, Collective Impact is deceptively simple: a clearly defined framework with three pre-conditions and five conditions and a growing body of experience about how such an approach can effectively address complex social issues. But as is often the case, the devil is…
This article looks at some typical tensions that can occur in mapping out a collaboration’s strategy. “How to respond to each depends on the issue, the larger context, the participants and their history with each other and a host of other factors. While dilemmas and…
“Understanding the tactics of collaboration can help make the unique value of working well together real,” writes the author of this SSIR article. “We can best move forward not by developing skills or becoming proficient with a specific methodology, but by advancing through stages of…
This resource is a compilation of blogs from keynote speakers at the conference “Transforming the Role of Business in Education” held at Stanford University on October 29, 2014. “Each of these pieces highlights key themes from the day on how companies can play a new…
“The economic and social challenges that affect the geographically large and diverse Appalachia region are too complex for an individual organization to address comprehensively,” argues Emily Mitchell writing for the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. “Many communities need large-scale growth or transition to other industries…
“Grantmakers rightly see themselves as critical partners — more than just funders — of programs to bring fields and communities together to tackle complex issues and bring about lasting change. … But because of their position and the power dynamics inherent in the relationship between…
“Companies are increasingly expected to join with other organizations — both public and private — to address social and environmental problems,” write McKinsey & Co’s Marco Albani and Kimberly Henderson. In this article, Albani and Henderson offer seven ways to make such alliances successful, including…