Module 3 - Step 2: Motivation to Collaborate

The wicked leader is he who the people despise. The good leader is he who the people revere. The great leader is he who the people say, "We did it ourselves."  -- Lao Tzu

Motivation to Collaborate

Collaborative processes don’t gain momentum unless potential participants see a benefit from the investment of their time and energy. 

In the Inter-Agency Services Collaboration Project (IASCP), the authors found that the motivation and perception of benefit  for many organizations in the NPO sector comes the difficulty of dealing with complex social issues or pressing gaps in service delivery that need to be addressed.

In one of the reports, the East Scarborough Storefront Project: A successful inter- organizational service collaboration, the notion of “overwhelming need” motivated  the initial community agencies and community activists to collaborate.   A new population consisting of refugees with few supports moved into short term housing in this suburban community and the need for services was so apparent that community members mobilized and invited in existing agencies to collaborate to provide services.  -

Motivation to collaborate emerged as critical element in another IASCP project, the Korean Interagency Network (KIN) process. Participants keenly expressed their anxiety over the sustainability of their organizations and concern over their communities to equitable access to public resources in one of the planning sessions. Participants and observers noted that mainstream and larger organizations that were members of KIN did not feel compelled to participate.  Many thought that they did not share the same issues that motivated the other participants to collaborate.  

In another report for the IASCP project: Service Delivery Collaboration in the Toronto NPO Sector A Key Informant Survey by Heather Graham, the respondents reported that mandated collaborations are generally viewed as not sustainable – but not because of lack of resources so much as the lack of commitment to the issue; they aret seen more as opportunistic than having a genuine committtment to the problem.  So when funders build incented partnership programs, the motivation to participate by agencies is to secure the funding rather than deal with a complex problem or mess .

In another IASCP report: Service Delivery Collaboration in Nonprofit Health and Community Services What does Government Want, the author Rob Horwath surfaced a widespread view within government circles and documented in public reports, that collaboration is seen as tool to improve service delivery systems. Yet, policy supports to facilitate inter-organization collaboration are few and exist primarily at the municipal level. Most importantly, provincial supports do not exist even though this is the level of government where NPOs receive 80-% of their funding to provide community based health and social services. The preceding paragraph needs tobe re-worded more simply.

Throughout the IASCP research process, respondents  in the key informant study and round table reported their suspicion of the motivation of funders when they develop collaboration funding programs.  Without support to build the inter-organizational capacity needed to address the complex territory of collaboration and government’s  veiled efforts to downsize and streamline delivery systems, NPOs and Government funders seemed to be working at cross purposes. I assume this is the repondents’ view – it should be more clearly stated to reflect the speaker – this is not OHCC’s position; we have had numerous positive relationships with government funders who were supportive of our collaborative efforts

 The IASCP project reports documented the commitment to tackling difficult social issues despite the lack of funding for bottom up initiatives and the lack of capacity in the NPO sector. Many NPO organizations and their leadership are continuing to embark on new collaborative ventures to tackle the social messes that they are mandated to address.

And within that commitment, it always takes one person in one organization to say “lets step outside of our organizational boundaries and work with others to find a new strategy for this complex problem”.  This person if empowered to go forward, assumes the convening role.