Cross-sector collaborations are a response to the increasing recognition that many of the pressing challenges of our time are complex and requires a systems approach. Such challenges must involve multiple stakeholders, guided by principles of inclusion and equity, and draw on a full range of resources to achieve results that cannot be achieved by working in silos, including stakeholders’ expertise, experience and insights, relationships and networks, and financial contributions. Cross sector collaborations can catalyze adoption of innovations and policies and strengthen resilience when confronted by the unknown and unpredictable. While promising and extolled in principle, cross-sector collaborations can be difficult in practice due to structural and institutional barriers, as well as distinct assumptions, works styles, and disciplinary backgrounds of those engaged.
This course encourages students to understand the value and challenges of cross-sector collaborations and to gain insight on the skills and approaches required. The course is structured around student engagement and learning on collaboration cases that span geographic context and levels of action: domestic, national and global contexts. Through frameworks, practitioner testimonials and applied practice, students learn relevant frameworks for collaboration, explore assumptions from each sector, clarify and challenge their own assumptions and preconceptions about sectors, and identify their own strengths and gaps to become competent collaborators.