Section 2 - Process Lessons
2.2 Building Partnerships and Networks
A key feature of the projects in this study is the extent to which they were not only designed and delivered through partnership but how, in many instances, the project was used explicitly as a device to build partnership and influence partner behaviour. There are many outstanding examples.
- Medway Ruler, a collaborative project, brings together a number of local higher and further education institutions and local authorities and key local employers;
- Birmingham Core Skills Partnership includes partnership development is an explicit strand of project activity.
- Sowerby Bridge Forumi: now involving the local TEC, Calderdale MBC, and Calderdale College, the Forum is a partnership instigated by business. In 1995 a number of business people agreed to spearhead action - including, critically, promoting the updating of skills and learning - to reverse their town's decline.
- Co. Durham PIEL and LAC: the absence of networking between agencies was part of the rationale for the project.
Key Lessons
Promoting learning objectives needs to be a collaborative activity, particularly within disadvantaged communities. Participation in the design and implementation of a regeneration-funded programme can provide a stimulus to partnership working that survives the funding itself. Some of the ingredients required for the effective promotion of partnerships in this context include the following:
- involving key partners from the outset - sharing in scheme or programme development helps develop a sense of ownership;
- establishing a clear understanding of both the potential and the limitations of individual partners' contributions to the learning agenda; and
- ensuring that there are sufficient resources devoted to staff development to enable partners to gain some sense of each others' professional disciplines.
