Nonprofit organizations are exploring how to work together in new and creative ways. Why?

• Demand for services is up, along with competition for financial resources, making the drive towards efficiency increasingly important.
• Duplication of services is viewed as wasteful.
• Some types of restructuring are equated with cost-savings.
• The social issues that nonprofits address are larger and more complex and call for scaled-up solutions.

Understanding the types of strategic alliances is a good first step in determining a fit for your organization. There's general agreement that the types of strategic alliances follow a continuum. At one end are informal arrangements. At the other end are those that require high levels of formality, shared decision-making, and organizational integration.

The following types of strategic alliances are taken from the work of Dr. John Yankey, Ph.D., retired professor, Case Western Reserve University:

• Endorsement: Providing approval or support of a concept or action already conceptualized or completed by someone else. Example: letters of support.
• Co-sponsorship: Two or more organizations share (although not always equally) in providing a program or service.
• Affiliation: A loosely connected system of two or more organizations with a similar interest(s).
• Federation/Association: An alliance of member organizations established to centralize common functions.
• Coalition: Independent organizations that usually share a political or social change goal.
• Consortium: Organizations and individuals representing customers, service providers, and other agencies who identify themselves with a specific community, neighborhood or domain.
• Network: Organizations that share resources for mutual benefit, such as service provision.
• Joint Venture: A legally formed alliance in which member organizations maintain joint ownership (generally through a joint governance board) to carry out specific tasks or provide specific services.
• Acquisition: One organization acquires a program or service previously administered by another organization.
• Divestiture: One organization "spins off" a program or service to another organization.
• Merger: A statutorily defined alliance in which one organization is totally absorbed by another.

La Piana Consulting, a national firm with a practice area in strategic restructuring, includes the following categories in their Collaborative Map:

• Collaboration: Includes information sharing, program coordination, and joint planning. Organizations involved in collaboration remain independent with full decision-making power.
• Administrative Consolidation: Typically aimed at increasing efficiency, includes formal agreement for contracting, exchanging, or sharing services. Organizations involved in administrative consolidations share decision-making powers.
• Joint Programming: A restructuring where organizations share the launch and management of one or more programs. Organizations involved in joint programming share decision-making powers for the program while maintaining their independence in managing their own programs.
• Corporate Merger/Acquisition: Includes full integration of all programmatic assets and administrative functions.

The Nonprofit Mergers Workbooks
LaPiana Consulting

Part I: The Leader's Guide to Considering, Negotiating, and Executing a Merger and Part II: Unifying the Organization after a Merger.

The Reality Underneath the Buzz of Partnerships
Stanford Social Innovation Review

Article shares findings from a study of nonprofit partnerships and examines why most did not fulfill participants' expectations. Published in Spring 2005.

Exploring Greater Impact Through Strategic Partnerships
The Power of Possibility campaign

Initiated by BoardSource and leaders in the field of nonprofit restructuring, The Power of Possibility campaign provides resources and tools to help guide board discussion about the possibility of strategic alliances and restructuring.

The Benefits of Diverse Experience in Leading a Nonprofit
The Bridgespan Group

This survey of over 600 nonprofit leaders focuses on their backgrounds and their organizations, suggesting that nonprofits that seek new executive directors should focus on finding candidates with diverse skills sets and experiences, and learning how they have handled, adapted, and grown from them. This valuable information can help nonprofits support their new leaders as they adapt to the organization's culture and build key relationships outside of the organization.

Facts about Terminating or Merging Your Exempt Organization
IRS Publication 4779

Most tax-exempt organizations that end their operations, either through shutting down, transferring their assets or merging with another tax-exempt organization, must inform the IRS about the details of the action.

Partners for Sacred Places

Through training programs, information clearinghouse, and professional network, Partners for Sacred Places brings together a national network of expert professionals who understand the value of a congregation’s architectural assets, its worth as a faith community, and the significance of its service to the community at large.

Cutting Through the Complexity: A Roadmap for Effective Collaboration
Stanford Social Innovation Review

Discusses what it takes to make collaborations and networks actually achieve their ambitious goals.

Strategic Planning
National Minority AIDS Council (NMAC)

The purpose of this training manual is to provide learners with the fundamentals of building a successful strategic plan for operating a nonprofit support organization for AIDS advocacy, prevention and treatment.

Nonprofit Mergers and Acquisitions: More Than a Tool for Tough Times
The Bridgespan Group

Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are much more common in the nonprofit world than most would think, as this study of 3,300 deals across four states over 11 years shows.

Managing Collaboration Risks
Nonprofits Insurance Alliance

This booklet explores typical collaborative relationships that nonprofits engage in and how to manage or avoid the risks associated with them.

Funder Collaboratives: Why and How Funders Work Together
Candid Learning for Funders

Contributors share strategies for structuring a collaborative to fit its purpose, building strong relationships and resolving conflicts, and figuring out if the collaborative you're in is working. Argues that collaboratives are leading the field in bringing the voices of nonfunders - grantees, intended beneficiaries, experts, and others - into the process of making grants.

Case Studies: Mergers and Alliances
La Piana Consulting

Includes links to several case studies of organizations that have gone through strategic restructurings like collaborations, mergers, parent-subsidiary arrangements, joint programming, and administrative consolidations.

Beyond Collaboration: Strategic Restructuring of Nonprofit Organizations
National Center for Nonprofit Boards

La Piana Consulting's study offers an analysis of restructuring efforts among nonprofits and describes several strategies that funders might develop to support further collaborative effort.

Administrative Consolidations and Management Service Organizations
Nonprofit Law Blog

Organizations seeking to share administrative services have four options available: an administrative collaboration, administrative consolidation, MSO (management services organization), or external service provider.