Successive governments have promoted joint working between the public and private sectors (often known as ‘public-private partnerships’or ‘PPPs’) as a way of improving the delivery of health care, making the best of the different skills/experience which both sectors bring. However, although there has been a lot of research and helpful advice published around public agencies working together, partnerships between the public and private sector have often been neglected.
Created by: Dr Duncan Alexander
This toolkit aims to fill this gap. Although initiating a public-private partnership is a positive first step, building a successful partnership that achieves its potential over the long term is a totally different scale of challenge. It takes skill, care, and a lot of hard work and it is hoped you will find this toolkit helpful in meeting the challenge. This toolkit has been designed to be used to help existing partnerships to take stock and develop further in the future. If you are not at this stage, the appendix of the toolkit highlights several useful resources to help you prepare for getting a partnership off the ground, as well as structuring your written partnership agreement (Partnering Initiative, 2011, WWF, 2015, Nesta, 2019). Use of the toolkit will allow partner organisations to explore how relationships are developing and whether there are areas that need work on in the future. The task of making these relationships work on the ground often falls to individual leaders/practitioners (known as ‘boundary-spanners’ in the broader literature). While we know an increasing amount about the role of boundary-spanners in public-public partnerships, the toolkit summarises the findings of recent PhD research (Alexander, 2022) which explored these concepts in the context of relationships between the public and private sectors (where the cultural differences to be overcome are likely to be even more significant).
Description of Toolkit
The hybrid nature of PPPs makes them more complicated and under-researched than partnerships involving only public organisations or only private companies. PhD researchers reviewed the previous literature/theory, researched a series of case study partnerships across the country and developed a new framework to help understand these issues. It draws on elements of the Partnership Assessment Tool (‘PAT’) (Hardy et al., 2003) which has been extensively used in partnership research and has been independently verified as a usefulway of assessing the strengths and limitations of relationships within a partnership (Petch, 2008). This toolkit takes the PAT questions and uses the boundary wall framework developed from thePhD research to focus in particular on the role of boundary spanners within PPPs (i.e. how easy or otherwise it is to work across agency boundaries depends on the nature of the differences/divisions between partners – these are described in terms of a ‘wall’ and potential differences are explored in terms of the ‘height’, ‘density’ and ‘thickness’ of the wall, as well as the foundations on which the wall is built).
How can the Toolkit help you?
It provides material for a ‘diagnostic phase’(using tools tested during the PhD research to provide practical support to the development of the partnership). This will identify key barriers/success factors that need to be worked with for the partnership to be successful. It provides material to construct an Organisational Development (OD) plan for the partnership. The aim of the plan is three-fold:
- To provide opportunities to compare and contrast the views of ‘boundary spanners’ which will highlight things to celebrate as well as areas where additional effort and resources may be needed
- To provide structured information about participants’ perceptions throughout the partnership
- Use of the diagnostic phase will hopefully provide more openness and transparency about partners’ views on partnership working, which in turn will underpin the OD plan
It provides guidance on how to assess the initial impact of the toolkit. This is achieved by recompleting the material provided in the toolkit at the finish of the OD plan period, which in turn may contribute to an updated OD plan as well as a baseline for repeat exercises to measure changes over time.
Using the Toolkit
Stage 1 – Preparation
- Both partners agree to a partnership assessment
- Facilitator appointed (internal or external consultant)
- Creation of partnership assessment plan by facilitator (see next page for a worked example)
- Identify senior stakeholders and boundary spanners in each organisation
Stage 2 – Assessment
- Carry out semi-structured interview and administer PAT for senior stakeholders and boundary spanners in each organisation
- Additional boundary spanners are often uncovered from the interviews of the initial cohort. Interview and complete a PAT for these additional people
Stage 3 – Analysis
- The facilitator analyses the results of the questionnaire as well as picking out key themes from the semi structured interviews of the boundary spanners
- Using the methodology set out below, a first draft OD plan is generated
Stage 4 – Feedback and Next Steps
- Sense check the results of the OD plan with one or two selected individuals
- The OD plan to be issued to all stakeholders
- An optional (but recommended) workshop can be run which will allow the partners the chance to look in more detail at the areas of the partnership that have been identified as needing work
- Next steps for the partnership should then be agreed and communicated to all stakeholders