The training and capacity-building work of the Staff College on partnerships dates back to 1998 when the UN Fund for International Partnerships (UNFIP) provided seed-funding for a pilot project called ‘Training UN Leaders to Build Public-Private Partnerships’. This project was implemented in collaboration with the London-based Prince of Wales International Business Leaders Forum (IBLF).

The original Partnerships project pilot-tested skills training, country-based workshops and produced The Guiding Hand, a ground-breaking publication on partnership brokers. The initial phase’s key lesson learned was that UN systems and skills would require significant changes to accommodate the partnership paradigm.

With the acceleration of partnering activity and opportunity throughout the UN system in recent years, the need for capacity building and systemic change is even greater now than it was when the project was originally launched. Bringing together the UN system-wide learning activities of UNSSC and the wealth of experience and expertise of IBLF’s The Partnering Initiative, our current partnering skills training and capacity building activities represent a dynamic response to rapidly increasing demand. In 2005, UNSSC, IBLF, UNDP and Rio Tinto collaborated on the publication of The Brokering Guidebook, an expanded and updated resource for partnership brokers.

The Millennium Declaration and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) demonstrate that there is international consensus on the key challenges that have to be addressed in order to meet the needs and hopes of people everywhere. The UN Global Compact provides strategic leadership on UN engagement with business and civil society, and a supportive value-based platform designed to promote institutional learning. The cause of “larger freedom” as envisioned by the Secretary-General can only be advanced by broad, deep and sustained global cooperation among States and non-state actors. Effective partnerships between States, civil society organizations and private sector businesses may, in fact, represent an appropriate means to support the achievements of the MDGs.

Launched in December 2005, the Partnering Skills for Strategic Engagement course is designed to enhance the abilities of UN staff and their development partners to engage in and promote innovative and effective multi-stakeholder partnerships. In 2005-06, the course was delivered in Vienna, Geneva, Rome, Paris, Nairobi and Turin, and attracted more than 150 participants. In 2007, we will focus our efforts on UN programme staff and their development partners working at the regional and country levels as the project is fully integrated into the Development Cooperation programme. The first three courses in 2007 are planned for three different regions: Latin America and Caribbean, Asia / Pacific and Africa.

The first regional course will take place in Panama City, January 25-27, 2007. The venue will be the Country Inn Suites located at Amador in Panama City. The Asia/Pacific regional course will take place in Bangkok on February 27-March 1, 2007.

The Africa regional course is provisionally scheduled for late March in East or Southern Africa. The Africa course enrolment form will be made available as soon as the specific dates and location are confirmed.

For more information on the Partnerships project click here to download the brochure.

For more information on the Partnering Skills course, click here to download the course flyer and click here to download the Panama course enrolment form and click here to download the Bangkok course enrolment

For more information on the Partnering Skills course and other partnership training and capacity-building activities, please contact:

David Murphy
Senior Associate, Development Cooperation
UNSSC
+39 011 653 5909
d.murphy@unssc.org