Creating Value in Nonprofit-Business Collaborations: New Thinking and Practice

Chapter Four

Collaboration Stages and Value Relationships

Cross-sector relationships come in many forms and evolve over time. They can pass through collaboration stages that vary in terms of degree of intensity of the relationship, form of interaction, and structural arrangement between the nonprofit and the corporation. It is important to note that each stage has distinct dynamics and potential for collaborative value creation. This provides us with another window through which to view and understand collaborative value creation. We will explore this third component of the Collaborative Value Creation Framework first by explaining the concept of the Collaboration Continuum and then by examining how value is created at each stage along the continuum. ...