Social Innovation and Partnerships: Internal Partnership Dynamics That Support Strategic Social Change Initiatives Among Human Service Organizations

Background:The purpose of this study was to identify key within partnership dynamics that support the socially innovative efforts of human service nonprofits. Partnerships have become a necessary endeavour given the complexity of emergent social issues – such as poverty, rising income inequality, and increasing precariousness in housing and labour markets. Previous research has indicated that developing and participating in partnerships with organizations within and across sectors (i.e. non-profit, for-profit, and public) can be supportive of the social innovation efforts of nonprofit organizations. This previous research has shown that partnerships enable organizations to increase the likelihood of success in creating social value (through social innovation) by addressing the limitations of economic resources and political power that nonprofits experience when on their own. While there is a growing body of literature describing the importance and utility of engaging in partnerships, there has been a dearth of literature investigating the conditions that support the development and maintenance of these partnerships. We asked the following question: To what extent are the socially innovative efforts of human service nonprofits predicted by within partnership dynamics?

Methods: Utilizing quantitative research methods, a random sample of executive directors of human service nonprofits in Toronto, Canada were surveyed (n=165) to assess the extent to which they engaged in socially innovative efforts and their experiences of within partnership dynamics. Participants included those focusing on a wide range of social service user groups. Social innovation was assessed with Shier and Handy’s (2015) Human Services Social Innovation Scale, which has shown satisfactory construct validity and reliability with samples of nonprofits in Alberta, Canada and Pennsylvania, USA. The scale distinctively assesses three different types of social innovation; inclusive of socially transformative, product-based, and process-based social innovations. Based on previous qualitative research, the Within Partnership Interpersonal Dynamics Scale was developed for this study to assess four distinct aspects of within partnership dynamics: including, level of engagement; outcome orientation; quality of relationship; and alignment of goals. Structural equation modelling, with full information maximum likelihood estimation techniques, was undertaken with the MPlus statistical software program to assess the extent to which each of these four within partnership dynamic latent constructs predicted the extent to which participating organizations engaged in socially innovative initiatives.

Results:The findings show that higher levels of engagement and an orientation towards achieving outcomes were significant positive predictors supporting the socially innovative efforts among the study sample; inclusive of socially transformative, product-based, and process-based social innovations. The model demonstrates good fit indices: Chi-squared test of model fit = 169.9, p-value = 0.0337; CFI = 0.974; TLI = 0.964; RMSEA = 0.039.

Conclusions and Implications:The results provide an empirical model for understanding the underlying nature of successful within partnership dynamics. The findings provide insight into the positive conditions that promote the development of mutually beneficial relationships. Furthermore, the findings may be relevant to human service organization leaders and public policy actors in governments who aim to promote a greater inter-relationship among organizational actors in the government, private sector, and third sector.