Community as a factor in implementing interorganizational partnerships: Issues, constraints, and adaptations

This article reports findings from a community‐based study of collaboration among seven nonprofit humanservice agencies in a very low‐income urban neighborhood. The project, funded by a federal demonstrationgrant, was developed to prevent child abuse and neglect as an alternative to the existing public child welfaresystem. Findings suggest that privatization, funding uncertainties, and community‐level factors posedexternal stressors that constrained executives' ability to collaborate. The article identifies five keystressors, analyzes how each constrained the partnership, and then discusses specific adaptations made byexecutive leadership in political, technical, and interpersonal areas that facilitated strategic adjustment andrealignment in a very complex interorganizational arrangement and set of relationships. Finally, implications aredrawn for nonprofit managers, social policy, and nonprofit research.