Community as a factor in implementing interorganizational partnerships: Issues, constraints, and adaptations

In: Nonprofit management & leadership, Volume 14, Issue 1, p. 47-66

Abstract

AbstractThis article reports findings from a community‐based study of collaboration among seven nonprofit human
service agencies in a very low‐income urban neighborhood. The project, funded by a federal demonstration
grant, was developed to prevent child abuse and neglect as an alternative to the existing public child welfare
system. Findings suggest that privatization, funding uncertainties, and community‐level factors posed
external stressors that constrained executives' ability to collaborate. The article identifies five key
stressors, analyzes how each constrained the partnership, and then discusses specific adaptations made by
executive leadership in political, technical, and interpersonal areas that facilitated strategic adjustment and
realignment in a very complex interorganizational arrangement and set of relationships. Finally, implications are
drawn for nonprofit managers, social policy, and nonprofit research.