1. Building Strong Partnerships
Have this slide up when participants arrive. Use it to introduce the topic of building partnerships
Time: 1 minutes
Materials: None
Session time: 60 minutes
Building Strong Partnerships

2. Outline of Session Topics
Identify Potential Partners
Create an Invitation Matrix
Explore Partnership Opportunities & Challenges 1 2
Briefly outline the topics to be covered in this session.
Identify potential partners
Create an invitation matrix
Explore opportunities and challenges to participation
Time: 1 minutes 3

3. Building Your Team
Building a strong, diverse team early is key to the success of the community’s effort. This slide transitions to a discussion of who should be on the team.
NOTE: OPPE has probably just talked about their Communities of Faith and Opportunity Initiative. This process can help in developing Local Prosperity Councils.
Or, if participants would rather pursue the priorities in a different way, this process will be equally helpful as they develop their partnerships.
Time: 1 minute
Materials: None

4. Who is at the Table? Who Else Should Be?
Starting with what we know…
The Asset Mapping exercise from yesterday will provide some starting points to partnership development.
Ask participants to pull out their Asset Map from yesterday in relationship to the priority they are pursuing today.
Have them take a few moments and :
Put a check mark by the assets they need where they already have strong partnerships developed.
Then put a star by assets where their relationships need to be strengthened.
These checks and stars give some starting points to who should be part of the team.
Materials: Asset Map Handouts from yesterday’s session.
Time: 10 minutes

5. Developing a Win-Win Invitation
Your Team
Community Agencies and Individuals
Being thoughtful about who you invite and why you are inviting can help overcome some of the common challenges of involvement we just discussed while building on the benefits.
This diagram shows how to create a “win-win” partnership that forms the foundation for getting others involved.
Any time a team is being formed, invited partners need to have a clear understanding of why they are being asked to help (how will the person benefit our effort) as well as how participation will benefit that individual. Having these two messages clearly in mind when approaching a potential partner will greatly increase the likelihood of their participation.
Distribute the Designing a Win-Win Invitation handout.
Instruct participants to return to their Asset Mapping worksheet and list the potential partners where they know they need to focus attention (the ones that had stars by them.) Once they have listed them, begin thinking about these two questions for each and fill in on the handout:
How will partnering benefit this person/agency in their work or mission?
How will I benefit by having this person/agency join with me? What specific asset (tangible, knowledge, skill, relationships, etc.) do they have that will benefit this effort?
For instance: (feel free to adapt to your priority)
For an e-Connectivity initiative, suppose you identified a local library as a potential partner.
The benefit for you may be access to computers where people could come and learn digital skills.
The benefit for the library could be that by working together, you could help bring more people to visit the library so they can learn these skills.
While there will not likely be enough time to complete this entire worksheet, encourage participants to complete this information for at least 2-3 potential partners.
Once participants have had time to complete a few examples, have them pair up and practice an invitation.
Then, either have a few volunteers role play an invitation to a potential partner on the list. OR divide the group into pairs and have each pair role play an invitation.
Time: 20 minutes
Materials: Designing a Win-Win Invitation

6. Opportunities and Challenges

7. Green Light/Red Light Organizations to which you currently belong
Organizations of which you once were a member
NOTE: This activity is intended to help set the stage for the overall discussion. Have participants work quickly, only providing a few answers for each section. More time will be given to this at the close.
Exploring the reasons people are inspired to join an organization and contribute their skills, energy and time is an important consideration. Most people have been part of a group only to have later lost some interest or even quit the organization. Some common themes usually emerge when exploring reasons why people join groups and reasons why they leave. This slide and the next, along with the Red Light/Green Light handout, will help the participants think about the good and the bad aspects of being part of a group and about incorporating the good features while avoiding pitfalls that can discourage sustained involvement in the group’s efforts. Keep this activity upbeat and moving quickly.
Hand out the Red Light/Green Light page and ask participants to quickly list organizations or groups to which they currently belong in the top left box. These can span across professional, social, or any other aspect of their lives.
Once people have had a few minutes to complete that box, ask them to move to the bottom box on the left. Ask them to list organizations or groups of which they were formerly members but no longer participate. (Two clicks of the mouse will bring up the second topic and graphic.)
Time: 5 minutes
Materials: Handout - Red Light/Green Light

8. How can you apply these insights to your partnership?
Why?
Why have you stayed involved?
Why did you leave?
Moving to the right side of the handout, ask participants to consider their lists in the top left box (current organizations) and list reasons they are participating in the top right box. Why is participation in this group important to you?
After a few moments, ask them to consider the list in the bottom left box and list reasons (bottom right box) they left. (Use mouse clicks to bring up second question.)
After completing this handout, ask participants to quickly share in one or two words some of the reasons they joined groups and reasons they left. Avoid storytelling at this point. The purpose is to get to the reason in search of themes. Record responses on two separate flip charts.
Once you have these responses, ask the group to consider common themes that can be applied to their work as a team to promote involvement. For instance, some frequent responses to this exercise include such themes as time commitments, relevance to own interests, group dynamics, etc.
Time: 10 minutes
Materials:
Green Light/Red Light handout
Flipchart
Markers
How can you apply these insights to your partnership?

9. Debrief Who were unusual partners you are considering?
What is the biggest challenge you will face in getting partners?
What can you do to help overcome this challenge?
What is the greatest benefit of getting these partners on board?
Use the questions on this slide to debrief the session.
These can either be done as one large group or in smaller roundtables, depending on the size of the group.
Who were unusual partners you are considering?
What is the biggest challenge you will face in getting partners? (reflect back on the opening red light/green light activity)
What can you do to help overcome this challenge?
What is the greatest benefit of getting these partners on board?
Time: 5 minutes

10. Questions and Discussion