Mark Nieker
President, Pearson Foundation
The Pearson Foundation is proud of its involvement in the Citi-FT Financial Education Summit, and about our opportunity to help showcase one key theme that was repeated often by Summit delegates: the idea that bringing together multiple stakeholders in financial education was the best way to ensure success.
Throughout our time in Delhi, presenting delegates emphasized that effective partnerships are instrumental both to helping to initiate new financial education programs, and to bringing the best of these programs to scale.
In the course of the Summit, delegates from around the world emphasized a common set of requirements for building successful collaborative projects. Below are six guidelines for any financial education organization might consider at the outset of any partnership-driven initiative:
1. Know thyself. Each organization involved needs to be clear with themselves and each other what their motivations and goals are for participation.
2. Take time for due diligence. Think about what you are looking to gain from a partnership, and how potential partners can provide this. Take the time to evaluate what your own strengths and weaknesses are, and how another organization might complement those.
3. Share a vision. Besides focusing on the technical details of a partnership, it is important that all parties share the overarching vision of a project. The broad goals can help drive the joint and individual decision making, reducing the potential for confusion or misunderstandings.
4. Invest in social capital. Take time from the beginning to develop a good working relationship, based on the mutual trust of each partner.
5. Build organizational capital. Ideally, each organization will bring different skills and compentencies to the project. Take the opportunity to learn from each other, and in doing so, grow your own organization’s abilities.
6. Make the partnership a priority. Be focused and aware of the partnership throughout the project. Communication and flexibility are key to working together successfully, and those can only be accomplished if adequate resources and attention are dedicated.
Throughout the Summit in India, we heard of initiative after initiative that incorporated some or all of these guidelines. Through follow-up interviews, we’ve created an overview of six of the most interesting and effective partnerships presented, and we invite you to explore these highlights in the accompanying Partnership Profiles.
