Guiding PrinciplE 4
New Partnerships and Coalition Building
Cultivating new partnerships and building coalitions amplifies project impact.
Introduction
Focusing resources to better understand and meet community needs
Advancing health equity requires a significant level of time, energy, and resources that no single organization can shoulder alone. By building strong partnerships and coalitions, organizations can consolidate resources, expand their reach, and increase the types of services they are able to offer. Cross-cultural coalitions that bring diverse communities together around a common purpose can break down silos and stereotypes and build collective understanding and power.
No two partnerships or coalitions look alike. While there is no one right way to partner, most strong partnerships are built on trust, reciprocity, shared values, and mutual respect. By leveraging one another’s skills, capacity, and strengths, and supporting one another through challenges, organizations can identify the most effective ways of serving their communities.
Advancing health equity video series guiding principle 4: Cultivate new partnerships and build coalitions. Watch more community stories.
Discover Four Strategies Below
Dive into a slice of Guiding Principle 4 below from our Community Guide to Advance Health Equity. Explore across the 4 strategies of Guiding Principle 4 to discover how to amplify project impact through partnerships and coalition building. Learn more and see additional stories and examples in the full Guiding Principle 4. To learn more about how to build strong and lasting partnerships, explore snapshots of the 4 strategies below.
Strategy 1:
Engage partners to amplify impact
While each Vaccine Equity Project community partner had a unique approach to building and sustaining partnerships, all five relied on organizational partners and strategic community linkages to expand the impact of their work. Collaborating helped them to reach new communities, increase their outreach capacity and expand the types of programs and resources they could offer. Vaccine Equity Project community partners reported that partnerships were a critical component of their work, and that new partnerships were a lasting benefit of the project– the most valuable return on investment.
The work is bigger than us.
DHF
Implementation
ideas
Engage partners with skills and capacity different from your own.
Strong partnerships are characterized by balance, reciprocity, and mutual benefit. Make note of areas where your organization has a gap in skills or capacity (e.g., grant-writing, translation, evaluation, digital engagement strategies, etc.) and consider how existing or potential organizational partners may be able to help bridge these gaps. At the same time, consider the unique skills and capacity that your organization brings to the table, and talk to your partners about how you can mutually support one another.
Partner with organizations that serve geographic areas or communities different from your own.
Partnering with organizations that represent and serve these communities is one way to fast-track the relationship-building process and reach new communities within a limited timeframe.
Think outside the box about ways in which organizations can partner.
Partnerships may range from deep collaboration and project co-ownership to information and data sharing to simply promoting one another’s events. When deciding how to partner, consider one another’s goals, timelines, and available resources. Written documentation is important in case of staffing or Board changes during the project work together.
Set aside ample time to discuss one another’s strengths, challenges, and needs.
Ensure that you and your partners designate time to plan on how to leverage one another’s strengths, support one another through challenges, and sustainably build one another’s capacity.
Respect cultural autonomy throughout partnerships:
While large, institutional partners can enable you to build organizational capacity and funnel resources to the communities you serve, ensure these partners respect cultural autonomy and are prepared to engage from a place of cultural humility before connecting them with your community.
Establish open lines of communication.
You and your partners’ goals and needs will likely change over time. Schedule routine check-ins so that you can adapt and course correct as needed, and stay mindful of power dynamics and imbalances.
Keep in mind
Project Partner Example
DHF and partner organization California Association of African-American Superintendents and Administrators (CAAASA) co-hosted six community town halls bringing together speakers and attendees from Latinx and African American communities across California (including Fresno and Bakersfield). DHF and CAAASA further expanded their reach by partnering with the California Department of Health to livestream the closing plenary at CAAASA’s Annual Summit: “Addressing Misinformation on Educational Concerns in Communities of Color Due to COVID-19.”
Reflections
What organizations or groups could you partner with in your community to extend your organizational reach or impact?
Are there current short-term or task specific partnerships you could expand into more long-term and mutually beneficial relationships?
Strategy 2:
Build cross-cultural coalitions
Building cross-cultural coalitions enables diverse communities to build collective power and share assets to achieve mutual goals. While developing and sustaining a coalition requires significant time and resources up front, it can yield tremendous benefits for your organization and the communities you serve. Too often, communities with legacies of social and historical injustice are pitted against one another to compete for resources despite facing common barriers to health equity rooted in systemic oppression. Coming together around a common purpose and leveraging cultural differences can decrease competition, create new opportunities for all parties, and build unity.
No one organization could ever reach and affect all of the communities in NYC – it takes a collaborative effort to reach better equity and better outcomes for all of NYC.
PHS
Implementation ideas
Collaboratively define your common purpose and shared goals.
To the extent possible, take your time developing a shared understanding of your common purpose and revisit it as needed. In addition, it is critical to co-develop—and routinely reexamine—your shared understanding of the coalition’s structure, decision-making processes, and policies and procedures as well as each partner’s roles and responsibilities.
Establish a strong foundation of cross-cultural communication.
Communication styles can vary widely across cultures. You may need to invest time and resources upfront to increase capacity for cross-cultural communication among partners before engaging in substantive health equity work. Openly discussing your communication styles and preferences – and avoiding assumptions – can help ensure that all voices are heard and valued.
Honor and leverage the power of your cultural differences.
Although cultural differences can lead to miscommunications and misunderstandings, they are also a source of strength for your coalition. Individuals from diverse cultural backgrounds bring unique and rich experiences, perspectives, and ideas that can open everyone’s eyes to new opportunities and possibilities. Keep in mind that there is great diversity within cultures. As you get to know one another, remain open to challenging any existing stereotypes, assumptions, or biases you or your colleagues may hold.
Collectively decide on strategies for overcoming disagreements, repairing harm, and rebuilding trust.
As a group, collectively decide on potential strategies for working through disagreements, repairing any harm , and rebuilding trust. Keep in mind that preferred strategies are likely to differ across cultures and individuals. You can explore various approaches until you find the best fit for your coalition.
Leave space for competing priorities.
Recognize that cross-cultural partners may have different and/or competing priorities – create space for these differences, while remaining focused on your common purpose and shared goals. Co-create clear expectations and guidelines regarding decision-making processes and conflict resolution strategies as early as possible.
Create the foundation for a lasting partnership early on.
If you’re working with a new partnership or coalition, discuss the benefits of a sustainable and equitable long-term relationship, and what that might look like, before reaching the end of an initiative or campaign together.
Be aware of power imbalances within partnerships:
Remain mindful of the ways in which societal inequities—across race, ethnicity, gender, education, sexuality, religion, and more—can reproduce themselves in your coalition’s structure and approach.
Keep in mind
Project Partner Example
Project HEALINGS developed and continues to maintain a centralized website, which includes data, resources, promotional materials, and contact information for all coalition members as well as a social media presence. It designed the site to serve communities connected to more than 30 non-profit organizations around a common purpose of providing Minnesotans with access to culturally and linguistically relevant information about COVID-19 prevention and vaccination.
Reflection Questions
Are there other organizations or communities that you are often competing with for funds? What would it look like for your organizations to work together and share resources?
Who are the communities in your service area that share common experiences and goals and face common barriers to health equity?
Strategy 3:
Work with partners to navigate shifting environments
The complex political environment and rapidly shifting public health guidance that happened during the COVID-19 pandemic – from myths regarding the origins of the virus to debates over stay-at-home orders, school closures, and mask mandates – exacerbated confusion and mistrust of medical and governmental systems. Community partners relied on one another to navigate these challenging social and political landscapes and adapt. Despite differences in culture, language, and geography, many of their communities faced common barriers to vaccination and shared similar concerns. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, these partners came together to share information and resources, support one another through challenging conversations and experiences, and build bridges across differences.
For busy multi-generational households with frontline workers and school children in the family, this barrage of constantly changing guidance is overwhelming and ultimately drives many residents away from the very supports and services we are trying to offer.
DHF
Implementation ideas
Share responsibility for staying up to date on public health guidance.
For example, you could divide topics (e.g., quarantine and isolation guidelines, youth vaccination, treatment options) based on familiarity or interest and then develop strategies, such as routine meetings, email listservs, or web-based platforms, for sharing relevant information with one another. Distributing ownership of these responsibilities across partners can help you all remain up to date and reach a wider network of people with important and consistent updates.
Have ongoing dialogues with your partners about anticipated political challenges.
As you embark on a new project or set of activities, talk to your partners about the types of political challenges you each expect to encounter. You can also consider proactively developing potential strategies, solutions, and resources that may come in handy in the future, and working with partners who have the infrastructure and experience needed to engage in advocacy.
Make space for different voices and opinions.
You and your partners may find that you do not see eye-to-eye – with one another or with members of your communities – on any number of health-related issues. As much as possible, remain open, seek out areas of agreement, and acknowledge that you may not be able to change one another’s minds. Invite people into dialogue- it is likely that you have common ground somewhere.
Create public service announcements (PSAs):
Small acts of support and solidarity can make a big difference. Some political challenges will remain outside of your and your partners’ immediate control. Consider small yet meaningful ways in which you can support one another and your communities even under difficult circumstances. Partnerships provide opportunities for authentic connections across communities where a text or phone call of support can go a long way in strengthening relationships.
Political disagreements can be highly charged.
To the extent possible, work with your partners to plan how you will de-escalate tense or heated conversations. While disagreements can be uncomfortable, they should not make anyone feel unsafe, and no one should ever be targeted or attacked because of their identity or group membership. View challenging interactions as moments of opportunity to invite each other into dialogue and shift perspectives, and share language that helps build mutual recognition that partners can use.
Lean on one another:
Even if your partners serve different communities than your organization, they may be experiencing similar challenges, such as the spread of misinformation, rapidly shifting public health guidance, or the politicization of vaccinations. You can rely on your partners as a resource and share your own strategies for overcoming common barriers to health equity.
Keep in mind
Project Partner Example
When an ITCM webinar was joined by a potential partner who posted anti-vaccine messaging in the chat, the facilitators engaged them in a thoughtful conversation about their concerns instead of removing them from the meeting. The individual shared that their account had been hacked and that they did not support the messaging that was posted, but were impressed that the views had been taken seriously instead of shut down without explanation. ITCM developed a partnership with the participant’s organization, the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma, which has lasted far beyond the project period. You can read more about their work together in this case study.
Reflection questions
How might recent changes to the political environment or public health guidance affect the communities you and your partners serve? How can you support your partners and their communities as you navigate these changes together? How can they support you and your community?
Strategy 4:
Establish lasting partnerships
Throughout the pandemic, community-based organizations faced the dual challenge of responding to the acute threats of COVID-19 transmission and infection while also addressing the broader health and social inequities that predated – and will outlast – the pandemic. While short-term partnerships were critical for rapidly distributing resources and protecting the immediate health and safety of their communities, establishing long-term partnerships led to sustained increases in organizational capacity and program impact. Through ongoing partnerships established in the first year of funding, Vaccine Equity Project community partners continue to reach new communities and bring new resources to the communities they served prior to the pandemic. Many partnerships have expanded to ensure access to routine vaccinations, promote health literacy, and address other systemic barriers to health equity.
We built relationships that we want to continue. That was the goal — to make sure long-term relationships were being built, not just for the project.
AFAHO
Implementation
ideas
Start planning for sustainability early:
While some partnerships may be best suited to short-term or one-off collaborations, you will likely want to sustain others beyond the current funding period or public health emergency. It’s never too early to initiate sustainability planning. Engage in open discussions about shared goals and interests, brainstorm future project ideas, outline necessary resources, and explore potential funding sources.
Make the case for ongoing investment.
Demonstrating the value of your partnership and sharing your successes is key to securing ongoing support and funding. Work closely with your partners to decide how you want to tell the story of your work and develop a plan to collect the necessary data.
Allow your partnerships to evolve alongside your work.
Community-based organizations developed new partnerships to address the acute impacts of COVID-19. As attention expands to address a wider range of social issues (e.g., learning loss during the pandemic, mental health, access to preventive care), you and your partners may find it beneficial to revisit one another’s skills and consider how best to leverage your unique strengths.
Maintain partnerships even during “off times” for funding.
If you experience reductions or gaps in funding, consider low- or no-cost ways of maintaining relationships with your partners. For example, you can continue to share information and resources, promote one another’s work, and schedule informal check-ins or social events to keep the lines of communication open.
Explore local and national opportunities:
Some funders offer grants explicitly designed to support community-based collaborations, partnerships, coalitions, and other collective impact work. You and your partners can explore local and national opportunities that may be a good fit for your goals, structure, and capacity.
Trust is foundational to successful partnerships.
Maintain open and honest communication about the likelihood of future funding and set clear expectations for how funding will be shared and distributed across partner organizations. For example, discuss what should be done if one partner needs to share leadership or step back during the project.
Use evaluation tools to make your case.
There are many publicly available evaluation resources and low-burden methods for capturing impact that you may wish to explore. Check out the resource library for some options.
Keep in mind
Project Partner example
PHS has established partnerships across the city with Make the Road NY, PHS Harlem Health Advocacy Partners Program, La Jornada Food Pantry, Hunger Free NYC, and a number of faith groups and health centers that combine resources to support pregnant persons across NYC. As the COVID-19 pandemic has progressed, PHS and its partners have kept pace with new materials and resources on topics such as long COVID. Meeting on a regular basis has allowed PHS and its partners to ensure that they remain on the same page regarding their vaccine equity goals..
Reflection questions
Thinking about existing and/or prospective partnerships, what do you want these relationships to look like 5 years from now? 10 years? 20 years?
If you are collaborating with new partners who work in a different space or provide a different service than your organization, how can you maintain this connection after the end of a set project?