April 6, 2006 | Read Time: 2 minutes
A new report shows that European charities and businesses are more likely than those in the United States to collaborate on long-term marketing deals.
The report released by Ethical Corporation, a British magazine, was the periodical’s first study of business-charity partnerships.
It examined any type of deal in which businesses did more than give money, such as donating marketing and other assistance to help charities increase their budgets and their visibility.
It was based on almost 100 interviews with business and charity leaders, as well as government officials, consultants, and scholars from both Europe and the United States.
According to the study, businesses in both Europe and the United States believe charities need to take steps to become more accountable and more transparent in their finances before marketing and other types of partnerships would become commonplace.
And many charities say they are uncertain of companies’ motives. Nearly every respondent mentioned what the report termed the “trust issue” when naming challenges to forming charity-corporate partnerships: Charities are often skeptical of companies’ intentions in offering to collaborate with nonprofit organizations.
Yet some respondents believe that even partnerships that arise out of conflict or mistrust can eventually flourish.
“We’ve found that we can change a lot by standing outside a business shouting at the top of our lungs, but we can often change even more by sitting down with that same business’s leaders to address both sides’ concerns in a cooperative spirit,” said Bruce Friedrich, one of the report’s participants and an official of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, in Norfolk, Va.
Role for Government
Both charity leaders and business executives said that governments could play a role in helping to broker relationships between nonprofit and for-profit groups.
Several respondents also said that church groups and small and medium-sized businesses — organizations that have typically not forged alliances — should also step up their involvement in partnerships.
Representatives from nonprofit organizations said that benefits from working with businesses included providing nonprofit groups with money, managerial and technical expertise, and credibility in the eyes of the public or the government.
However, charity officials also said such partnerships could harm a nonprofit group’s reputation as an organization that pushes for social change, or create more work and bureaucracy for the charity involved.
Business executives said they thought charity partnerships could also elevate companies’ reputations with customers, stockholders, and the news media.
But businesses also feared that teaming with charities could put the company at risk, both financially and legally, if they did not choose nonprofit groups wisely.
For a copy of the report, send an e-mail message to ethicalevents@ethicalcorp.com.
