John Talbot, executive vice president of OPEN MINDS, a member of the Alliance for Children and Families’ Executive Consultant Select Group (ECSG), advises that entering into a back office collaborative—even a simple group purchasing agreement—must be a deliberate, thoughtful process.
Most importantly, it needs to tie back to your agency’s organizational assessment and strategic plan.
Organizations should consider questions such as:
How will a collaborative help my agency further its mission?
What are the anticipated costs and benefits to my agency?
What potential operational and human resource implications do we anticipate?
Talbot and the agency executives involved in collaboratives such as MACC CommonWealth Services (read the companion article) and Chicago’s Back Office Cooperative (read part one of this two-part series) offer these tips:
Visit other back office collaboratives and get first-hand knowledge of their strengths and potential pitfalls.
Obtain an outside assessment to determine the benefits and risks of the collaborative.
Be sure you have the solid backing of your board of directors. This is a risk-taking venture. There are no guarantees.
Be prepared to devote considerable time to the collaborative, particularly in the start-up phase.
Be ready to share the role of executive with other executives in the collaborative. You will have to make compromises and won’t have sole decision-making power.
The collaborative must have a clear strategy and strong leadership to see it through.
Have clearly stated goals and well-defined outcomes to measure the collaborative’s success.
The greater the degree of integration, the more important it is that the member agencies have congruent missions, cultures, and goals.
Start small. Learn to work together and get some successful products launched before expanding membership and tackling more challenging projects.
For more information about OPEN MINDS and all Alliance ECSG members, the ECSG website.
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