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Newsletter - March 09

Partnership eNews

- news & views from the Global Business Partnership Alliance

This month
	> WELCOME > Innovating with others > Checking the robustness of your critical relationships > Working with listening > Developing an internal collaboration strategy > Partnering between China and the West

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	> Innovating with Others > GBPA NEWS > More on Discoveries > More on events > Partnering in and with India > GBPA services

GBPA Building effective relationships in the downturn

> WELCOME

Most leadership teams are facing challenges in the global economic downturn that they have not experienced before. As organisations critically review their overheads and how their services are delivered, it is putting Client and Service Provider relationships under stress. Initially, we were hearing clients say that they were going to pressure their suppliers to drive their charges down. Since the beginning of this year, we've seen a change in approach. There is recognition that a short-term cost-out fix is not the answer. If organisations are to find the optimum way to drive out costs and get the most out of their key external relationships through the next two or three years of anticipated, and unprecedented, economic turmoil, there is a need to focus on developing their key Service Provider relationships into something far more collaborative. In this eNews you are invited to participate in a practical collaborative innovation experience where you can learn what it takes to innovate with others, and can read about other GBPA events and GBPA's Relationship Healthcheck to support organisations and their partners in these challenging times. Do get in touch if there are any particular areas that you would like to explore with us. Amanda Crouch CEO Global Business Partnership Alliance

> Innovating with others

What does it really take for people to work together to successfully develop new ideas? GBPA and NESTA are pleased to invite you to Innovating With Others, a half-day event in which senior business people across a range of industry sectors will be able to explore how to collaborate to innovate. Utilising practical materials created from GBPA and NESTA's research amongst well-known corporate innovators, you will have the opportunity to put into practice our insights into what makes successful collaborative innovation happen. The objective is for participants to leave Innovating With Others better equipped to develop collaborative innovation within their own organisations and with partners. Go to Innovating with Others to find out more, and have a look at one minute video excerpts on Explore, Extract and Exploit and let us have your views, experiences and comments. The event is on Tuesday 24 March, 9.00 am to 1.00 pm, with breakfast from 8.30 am and Buffet lunch at 1.00 pm, hosted by NESTA at 1 Plough Place, London, EC4A 1DE. To participate in this practical collaborative innovation experience, register here. Innovating with Others

> Checking the robustness of your critical relationships

There has never been a time when it has been more critical for both Customer and Service Provider organisations to ensure that their key relationships are in the best possible state and equipped to deliver the greatest possible value. GBPA's Relationship Healthcheck enables the current state of a critical business relationship to be assessed, the future desired state identified and the collaborative journey to get there agreed. Some of the key benefits include: Provides an objective assessment of the relationship to enable issues to be surfaced and addressed collaboratively Identifies areas for potential greater value realisation Minimises the risk of exposure to relational failure Reduces management time spent on issue resolution and enables focus on delivering value Indicates the degree to which the participants are aligned on the overall objectives and how well these objectives are shared and understood among the respective parties to the relationship Identifies both parties' perspectives regarding understanding and respect for each others' working styles and whether cultural differences are sources of difficulty or positive contributors Indicates the degree to which communications and processes are aligned and working effectively between the parties Enables the participants to examine how well the strengths of each organisation and their respective resources are being leveraged. To check the robustness of your critical relationships and to explore your relationship needs, please contact Liz Collins

> Working with listening

"Organizations are linguistic structures built out of words and maintained by conversations. Even problems that aren't strictly communicational - failures of mechanical systems, for example - can be explored in terms of things said and not said, questions asked and not asked, conversations never begun or left uncompleted, alternate explanations not discussed" - Walter Truett Anderson The GBPA Special Interest Forum in London on 3 March (09:00 to 11:30) will explore the notion of listening as a core business process. What does this mean, and what shapes our listening at work? We will explore listening as essentially an interpretative process, and understand what is shaping how we interpret through listening. And we will explore our enemies of listening and identify what we might do to better understand our ways of listening. To register, please contact Magda Pansegrouw

> Developing an internal collaboration strategy

Does your organisation have a culture that promotes internal collaboration? If not, is there a strategy to achieve this, and how could it be implemented? The GBPA Special Interest Forum in London on 2 April (09:00 to 11:30) will consider how organisations can develop good collaboration across the whole business, especially at times of change. To register, please contact Magda Pansegrouw Find out more about GBPA Events

> Partnering between China and the West

GBPA is currently undertaking a research-led Discovery on the challenges that Chinese and Western companies experience when partnering with each other, and what they regard as the key enablers to partnership success. GBPA will be pleased to hear from any readers of this eNews that have experience of partnering with companies in China, including important customer and supplier relationships. Participants in this research will receive a free copy of the published report. To find out more about how you can become involved and gain access to the research, please contact Magda Pansegrouw

We look forward to the participation of members of the GBPA community and guests in our events, and please Email us for more information on GBPA and its services.

With best wishes from the GBPA team

Global Business Partnership Alliance

email: mpansegrouw@gbpalliance.com

phone: + 44 (0)203 0093 122

web: http://www.gbpalliance.com