By Marissa Jaross, JVA Consulting

JVA partners with more than 100 organizations every year — nonprofits, social enterprises, government agencies, foundations, and, socially-responsible businesses. We also facilitate meetings between new partners, helping them reach the common ground they need for success. Through this process with so many clients, we’ve learned a lot about what makes a partnership successful.

1) The most important aspect to a successful partnership is to select a partner that shares your values. While shared values may not be essential with the company that services your printers and copiers, it is absolutely essential with the partner that provides case management to your clients.

When it comes to selecting partners who share your values, you can simply start by comparing your Mission, Vision and Core Values with those of your potential partners.

2) Start small. Brainstorm a list of all the organizations you can imagine partnering with. Then, do a little reconnaissance work and look for the pros and cons of working with each organization on your list. Once you’ve narrowed down your list a little, ask your board and staff if they know anyone working at the organizations on your list, or if they have any other experience with any of the organizations. Do your homework, and eliminate those that aren’t a good fit.

3) Once you’ve done your research and created a short list, I think potential new partners really just need to get to know each other before embarking on an important collaboration. Sit down for coffee and talk. New partners need to make sure they are on the same page about absolutely everything, and the more time you spend doing this up front, the less likely it is that problems will develop down the road. In other words, over-communicate at the beginning to save yourself a headache down the road.

In response to the Affordable Care Act (ACA), we see a lot of small health clinics seeking partners to help them with billing and paperwork. For example, a small counseling organization that does not take Medicaid could be in a tough spot now that the ACA is helping to enroll people in Medicaid. Such small organizations often look for a larger provider to partner with so they can more easily meet the requirements to take Medicaid like Electronic Health Records and complicated billing structures.

Partnering with an organization may seem like a daunting and insurmountable task at first, but it doesn’t have to be.

4) You may want to work on a small project together before launching an official partnership. Doing that can tell you a lot about how well you work together.

5) Finally, you need to agree on as much as you can before you sign an agreement. What are the short- and long-term goals of the shared project? How will you communicate with each other over the course of the project? Do you want weekly meetings, or are monthly phone calls good enough? Remember, over-communicate and be frank and honest in these formative conversations.

Collaboration and partnerships have become much more common over the past few years, and will continue to be important moving forward.

What could you do better if you had a strong partner? What’s stopping you?

Marissa manages projects across JVA and specializes in health projects on the evaluation team.