Forming partnerships

Effective partnerships are built on knowledge, familiarity and equality among the partners. They are also built on good communication, understanding of roles, effective negotiation, consistency and stability. Every partner has a role to play in ensuring they work.

These sorts of partnerships are likely to be complex and affected by factors of which, despite your best efforts, you are unconscious — signs, symbols and histories that are understood as important by some participants and not others.

These can be located in language, arrangements and time, place, and social climate.

Accommodating these issues begins with enquiring of the other partners what they’d like, explaining what you’re up to and why, and honestly and openly figuring out together what might suit.

Some fundamental strategies, all relevant to forming partnerships, are described in the rest of this section.