Building Your Neighborhood

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Building Your Neighborhood

• Developing Community Partnerships

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What are Partnerships?

• Where each organization wants to help its
  partners become better at what they do. Arthur
  Himmelman

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Why Partnerships?

• No agency has all the needed resources to plan
  provide comprehensive services for people with
  disabilities
• New funding possibilities and creative solutions
  present themselves with partnerships

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Purpose of Partnerships

• To secure community resources needed to enable an
  individual with a disability to accomplish the
  goals s/he has identified
• To improve the capacity of CRPs and communities
  to provide services and resources that enhance
  quality of life for people with disabilities

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Continuum of Partnerships

• Networking
• Coordinating
• Cooperating
• Collaborating

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Networking

• The exchange of information for mutual benefit

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Coordinating

• Exchanging information and altering activities
  for mutual benefit and to achieve a common
  purpose.

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Cooperating

• Exchanging information, altering activities, and
  sharing resources for mutual benefit

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Collaborating

• Each organization wants to help its partners
  become better at what they do.
• Share risks, responsibilities, and rewards, each
  of which contribute to enhancing each others
  capacity to achieve a common purpose.

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More on Collaboration

• Collaboration is a mutually beneficial and
  well-defined relationship entered into by two or
  more organizations to achieve common goals. The
  relationship includes a commitment to
• define mutual relationships and goals
• jointly develop structure and shared
  responsibility
• implement mutual authority and accountability for
  success and
• share resources and rewards
• (Mattessich, P. and Monsey, B., 1992)

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What Makes Collaboration Work?

• Mutual respect, understanding, and trust
• Diverse membership
• Open and frequent communication
• Sufficient funds
• Skilled facilitator/leader
• Members share a stake in the process and outcome
• History of collaboration or cooperation in the
  community
• (Mattessich, P. and Money, B., 1992)

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What Inhibits the Success of Collaboration?

• Lack of understanding of other agencies policies
• Lack of communication between service providers
• Lack of time for collaborative efforts
• Unclear goals and objectives

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Other Inhibitors

• Excessive use of jargon
• Inconsistent service standards
• Establishment of a new layer of bureaucracy
• Difficulty in defining decision-making rules
  among team members
• Insufficient time
• Resistance to change among agency members

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Equal Partnership

• How to Achieve Equal Partnership When
  Collaborating
• Maintain equality as a value
• Bring all partners onto the team at the same time
• Avoid excessive jargon and acronyms
• Use consensus when making decisions

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How to be a True Collaborator

• Understand and believe
• In the principles that have led you to where you
  are
• Why you care enough to continue to work toward
  change and a better future for all people with
  disabilities
• What you have to offer
• Why you are a good collaborative partner (your
  unique skills, abilities)
• What your collaborative values are
• (adapted from Stemhjem, P., 1999)

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Successful Team Meeting

• Running a Successful Team Meetings or
  Participating in One
• The vision is shared throughout the meeting
• Expertise is recognized
• Dialogue and listening
• Safe environments to share information
• Reciprocal learning
• Shared responsibilities
• Shared leadership
• Active leadership by people with disabilities
• (adapted from deFur, Sharon H., 2003)

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The Interagency Agreement

• What should be included in an interagency
  agreement?
• Purpose
• Operating principles and procedures
• Inventories of existing services and funding
  sources
• Dispute resolution
• Cross-agency training
• Service Coordination
• (Hadden et al., 1995 Kilburn Critchlow, 1998)

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Developing an Interagency Agreement

• Form a committee to develop an agreement
• Include a variety of stakeholders
• Include people with disabilities
• Create a shared vision

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Possible Partners

• Families
• Vocational Rehabilitation
• Independent Living Centers
• Department of Labor
• One Stop Centers
• Other CRPs
• Employers

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• 2. Develop an action plan
• Prioritize and divide responsibility
• Be focused on the goal
• Develop a time line
• Be brief
• Distribute to all members

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• 3. Reach consensus on the purpose of the
  agreement
• Why are you writing an agreement?
• How will it help you accomplish your goals?

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• 4. Identify key items to include in the agreement
• Make it brief and focused
• Stick with user-friendly words
• Identify contact people to carry out the
  agreement
• Identify the process/protocol of the agreement

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• 5. Have follow-up meetings to discuss the
  agreement and how it is being carried out

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• 6. Evaluate the success/outcomes of the agreement
  
• Get input from all team members about the status
  of the agreement

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Example

• Collaboration between Goodwill Industries of
  Central Indiana, IPIC, Crossroads Easter Seals,
  Vocational Rehabilitation, Department of
  Workforce Development

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Is Interagency Collaboration the Solution?

• Do I need help?
• Is there someone who can help?
• Will they want to help?
• Is it worth the effort?
• Can I use the help when it is provided?

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References

• Brolin, D.E. (1995). Career Education A
  functional life skills approach (3rd ed.)
  Englewood Cliffs, NJ Merrill.
• DeFur, S.H. (2003). Parents as collaborators
  Building partnerships with school-based and
  community-based providers. In D. Wandry and A.
  Pleet (Ed.). A practitioner's guide to involving
  families in secondary transition. (pp. 27-39).
  Arlington, VA Council for Exceptional Children.
• Hadden, S., Fowler, S., Fink, D., Wischnowski,
  M. (1995). Writing an interagency agreement on
  transition A practical guide. Champaign, IL
  FACTS/LRE. (ERIC Document Reproduction Service
  No. 391328). Retrieved March 16, 2004, from
  http//facts.crc.uiuc.edu/facts5/facts5.html
• Himmelman, Arthur T. (1995) Collaboration for
  Change. Working Paper. Minneapolis, MN The
  Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs,
  University of Minnesota.
• Kohler, P.D., Field, S., Johnson, J.R., Izzo,
  M. (1997). Transition from school-to-life A
  workshop series for educators and transition
  service providers. Champaign Transition
  Research Institute, University of Illinois at
  Urbana-Champaign.
• Mattessich, P. and Monsey, B. (1992).
  Collaboration What makes it work? A review of
  research literature on factors influencing
  successful collaboration. Amherst H. Wilder
  Foundation [phone].
• Stenhjem, P. (1999). Signs of true collaboration.
  What's working in transition. Newsletter,
  Transition Technical Assistance Project.
  Minneapolis, MN Institute on Community
  Integration, University of Minnesota.