Community Learning Development Resource 302 – 06
DEVELOPING LOCAL CO-WORKING RELATIONSHIPS
SUMMARY
Local community development workers discuss concerns about collaboration.
Questions:
- Can we still be focussed and purposeful, delivering effective outcomes for our clients?
- Can we collaborate without compromising our core values, vision or our own work effectiveness?
- Have we the time and capacity to plan, manage, monitor, evaluate and review partnership arrangements as well as the rest of our work?
Worker feedback – a checklist for discussing a co-working arrangement:
- Is there a commonality of purpose or shared purposes?
- What are the benefits to be gained from the arrangement?
- Can we manage the culture and values across the relationship?
- Are there common or compatible styles and ways of working?
- Demands on our time for maintenance of the relationship?
- Resource implications of the arrangement?
- What are the communication and maintenance requirements?
- Alternatives – are there other ways of achieving the same ends?
- How close and inter-dependent do we want this relationship to be?
- How will we measure how well the arrangements work?