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BUILDING COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS

Christopher P., BruhlThe Business Council of Fairfield County, CT, USA

Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation ConferenceSeptember 18, 2007

Today’s Goals

Enhance knowledge on forming partnerships with business, government, and civil society sectors.

Develop understanding of successful organizational models of collaboration.

Learn how to develop and implement innovative approaches and strategies in building strong public-private partnerships.

The Business Council of Fairfield County A private corporation created by business

leaders in 1970 to serve Fairfield County, CT. Fairfield County has 900,000 residents and is

located to the northeast of New York City. The Business Council has 3,000+ members,

of which 300 are corporations, 60 are non-profit institutions like colleges and hospitals, and 2,700+ are professionals, small businesses, entrepreneurs, etc.

Geographic and governmental context

Fairfield County is economically integrated into the Metro New York region, which includes 21.5 million people, parts of four states, 21 county (regional) governments, hundreds of municipalities, and thousands of civil society NGO’s.

Connecticut, unlike its neighbors, does not have regional government or regional taxes.

Cross-sector, public-private collaborations are The Business Council’s primary way of working.

Collaborations

Require change. Initially increase what is unknown. Can increase risk.

Collaborations


Why bother?

Collaborations


Why bother?The pain is the price of the gain.

Collaborations: Pain, Gain

Pain More people in decision-making process More opportunity for confusion, delay and

conflict Challenge to Truth, Experience and Because

Gain New perspectives, more effective solutions Increased resources Growth: personal/professional, mission Improved results

The New Reality

Collaboration among key partners is a fundamental element of any human resource or economic development effort.

The Basis for Sustainable Collaboration: Organizations Organizations

Are formed for a purpose which endures over time.

Are defined by multiple factors, offering multiple points of connection.

Do not exist in vacuums. Make choices.

Organizations

Formed for a purpose, enduring over time Charters, charges, etc. Histories of success and failure. Existing identities in the eyes of others. Continue through decision making cycles. Built in obstacles to change.

Organizations

Are defined by Mission Culture Structure

Place with external environment Internal organization

Resources People

Organizations

Do not exist in vacuums Competitors Colleagues Societal and political change

Have relationship options Compete Coexist Collaborate

Options

Compete For resources For constituents For talent, power, visibility....etc.

Options

Coexist Unaware of others

Appropriate distance resulting from differing missions

Tunnel vision Aware of others

Without perceived need to interact Interested in collaboration, but prohibited.

Options

Collaborate Ad hoc, driven by individuals Encouraged or mandated, driven by higher

level of authority Sought, planned and ongoing, among

autonomous entities

Key Ideasabout Collaboration Many sustainable collaborations involve more

than two entities. The collaboration is not the reason for

existence – it is a means to an end The subject of the collaboration will have

different degrees of importance to different members of the collaboration – and to different individuals within collaborating organizations.

The Leader’s Path:Steps to Collaborative Relationships

1. Develop organizational/initiative objectives. The collaboration is not the reason for existence – it

is a means to an end.

2. Create a relationship map. Identify relevant working relationships that exist

within your organization’s activities. Who do you work with externally? (People and organizations.)

Who do the people you work with, work with? What local, regional, and national entities serve you

and the people/organizations you work with?

Steps to Collaborative Relationships

3. Develop a requirements profile. What resources (knowledge, access, money, public

policy, etc.) do you need to achieve your objectives?

4. Compare relationship map to requirements profile. Identify “pre-partners,” organizations with relevant

resources, within existing relationships. Identify “prospects,” organizations with relevant

resources that you have no relationship with. Prioritize ideal set of collaborative partners.


5. Explore potential common interests among current relationships. Discuss initiative/opportunity concept. Review missions, sources of resources, reporting

relationships, personnel, etc., seeking commonalities. Form ad hoc team of the willing to refine concept to

meet mutual needs and interests.

6. Reach out to the “unconnected.” Introduced by mutual relationship. Direct contact (“cold call”).


7. Explore the interests and needs of the unconnected individuals/organizations. Their needs matter more to them than your needs. Sustainable collaboration is based on mutual self

interest, not one-sided harvesting.

8. Invite (recruit) the unconnected with the most to gain from your preliminary objectives to participate in simple, trust-building activities. Jointly conducted needs assessments, or other

research Best practice sharing events.


9. Bring the “newly connected” into the ad hoc planning team; transition team to ongoing status. Incorporate input from new participants. Formalize team with specific mission, statement of

objectives, plan of work and approval by appropriate authorities for each participant.

10. Actively communicate about objectives and activities to all current and potential collaborators. Increases trust Encourages additional input Surfaces problems


11. Nurture working relationships outside the core initiative processes. Increases sense of belonging. Builds base of shared knowledge. Adds new perspective to core.

12. Vigorously, diplomatically, and continuously self-assess.

One Example of Building Collaborative Relationships US DOL/ETA/WIRED

Component of federal department

The WorkPlace Inc. Regional (sub-state) workforce improvement

board

Example...

Shared objective Integrate workforce, education, economic

development systems in geographic and jurisdictional regions where the economy already functions on an integrated basis.

Shared concern History and culture of competition among all

three systems, (made worse in this case by state political borders).

The Foundations of One Collaboration

Incentives (encouragement) for collaboration (no mandate)

Convener Social network builder Equal status for early and late arrivals


Incentives for collaboration (no mandate) US DOL ETA WIRED funding program

Convener The WorkPlace Inc.

Social network builder The Business Council of Fairfield County

Equal status for early and late arrivals Territory and population served doubled a year

into planning process.


US DOL ETA WIRED funding program Multi-year, multi-sector Placed results ahead of turf Focused on economic regions, not single

government jurisdictions Collaborators were more important than legal

applicant (substance over form).

Convener

A convener brings people and organizations together to explore interests, to share knowledge, and to enable them to reach their objectives.

A convener has a content role – it is not merely a meeting manager or facility. The convener is not a final authority – the convened need to own outcomes.

US DOL ETA WIRED broadened the role of the regional workforce development agency into that of convener, capable of working outside of traditional roles and boundaries.

Convener: The WorkPlace Inc.

The WorkPlace Inc. was willing to evolve, but did not have the multi-sector, two state relationships required to convene workforce, education and economic development leaders in an efficient way.

The Business Council was invited to plan and execute The WorkPlace’s convening strategy, as a full collaborator in the effort.

Common Interests

The WorkPlace Inc. and The Business Council already saw themselves as colleagues. Past history of modest cooperative ventures,

largely on the ad hoc, programmatic level. Compatible, non-competitive expertise and

resource bases. Existing relationships among professionals.

Social Network Builder

A social network is the set of individuals whose collective knowledge, positions and relationships create social capital greater than the summation of each individual’s capital. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

The Business Council deliberately links a number of specialized social networks together – the business community (with many subsets by industries, geography, etc), municipal and state officials, government, higher education, health care, etc. into a network of networks.

Social Network Builder: The Business Council Leaders of the two organizations jointly developed a

relationship map, identified skills and resources required, and selected an ideal group to serve as a leadership team.

The Business Council reached out to: Senior executives from the growth industries in our region

(financial services, health care, information technology) Leaders of the key economic development and education

institutions. Knowledge and opinion leaders with relevant skills and

perspectives. Peers in Westchester County business organizations to

conduct a similar effort, in partnership with The Business Council.

Social Network Builder

Participants included:Hospital CEO’s, college presidents, corporate human resource leaders, business owners, information technology directors, English as a Second Language program designers, nursing school deans, venture capitalists, municipal economic development directors, economists, NGO CEO’s, school district superintendents, elected and appointed officials from state, county, and local governments – and more.

Many were long term competitors with other members of the team.

A warning against temptation

A collaboration is not a collection of job titles from selected institutions. Nor is it a set of representatives who defend institutional interests, or a group of attendees of a series of meetings that are easier to attend than to decline.

A collaboration is a set of relationships among individuals within organizations whose resources are committed toward an accepted, collective purpose.

The journey from curiosity/compliance to collaboration Workforce development, education and economic

development professionals need to understand that collaboration is vitally important. Cohesion, trust, turf minimization can be gained by collaborative process management, not just initiative management.

Participants who perceive value will commit their organizations to collaborative relationships.

The Convener and Social Network Manager must constantly add value to the participants through their engagement in the process, from issue identification, to planning, to ongoing execution.

Collaborative relationships are like muscles: they get stronger through use. The Business Council conducted a series of events

throughout the process that were not directly related to planning process, yet were at the heart of building relationships and trust.

Two examples In Fairfield County, we invited the head of strategic

planning of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority - it runs the railroads, subways, bridges, busses, etc. for New York and New Jersey – to speak to a large public gathering and a small private dialogue.

In Westchester, we helped the Community College host a major conference on immigrants in the workforce. Close to 20% of the residents in both Westchester and Fairfield County are immigrants.

Collaborative relationships are like muscles: they get stronger through use.

The transportation program was about the agency’s long terms for the entire region. It was followed by a second private dialogue among people who care about workforce flows and labor markets. We had planners, elected officials, NGO’s, and major employers from both counties take part in the private dialogue. In the process, they learned more about the future of the region and continued the bonding-through-common experience process that is essential to true collaboration.

The immigration conference brought together people who care about workforce and demographic issues. A number of WIRED planning team members attended as presenters. Many were the same individuals who had attended the transportation session.

Collaborative relationships are like muscles: they get stronger through use.

These two events had very different technical content, yet produced one result in common. Shared learning and greater trust among team members who traditionally had not worked together.

Equal status: proof of intent

Westchester County leaders were welcomed as equals several months into a second, annual planning process.

Process chair was joined by two co-chairs Five work teams were co-chaired by Westchester

and Fairfield County leaders, with equal representation on the teams.

All data collection, asset mapping, etc. was doubled to include the expanded scope of effort.

A culture of “results over turf” was set and reinforced by the convener.

An early self-assessment

Leaders in all three key sectors, economic development, workforce development, and education, continue to be enthusiastic about their new collaborative relationships.

Teams of former competitors are working on self-funded, new ventures to solve common problems.

The Governors of Connecticut and New York have formally endorsed the venture.

Preliminary discussions about formal bi-lateral operating relationships are underway between several pairs of similar institutions currently working in one of the two counties.

Applying principle to practice

Collaboration among key partners is a fundamental element of any human resource or economic development effort.

We are hopeful that our effort to build collaborative relationships around a common set of objectives will, over time, transform our workforce development, education and economic development systems into one integrated system.

Thank you!Christopher P. Bruhl

President & CEO

The Business Council of Fairfield County, CT USA

[email protected]

www.businessfairfield.com

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