Frontiers in Health Services · 6 authors, 6 centres
This summary was generated by AI from a single paper. It has not been reviewed by a clinician and is not clinical advice. Verify against the source before acting on it.
A retrospective multiple-case study of four business-nonprofit partnerships in Boston found that acknowledging organizational differences—rather than emphasizing similarities—was key to building resilient, sustainable cross-sector partnerships that could respond to changing conditions.
This qualitative multiple-case study investigated managerial behaviors that enabled sustainable business-nonprofit partnerships addressing social determinants of health in Boston. The research team analyzed data from 113 semi-structured interviews across 42 organizations, 10 focus groups, and 29.5 hours of direct observation spanning four partnership models varying in integration level. Using thematic analysis, the authors identified that acknowledging differences between partners, rather than focusing on similarities, set successful partnerships apart. This acknowledgement introduced uncertainty that managers found uncomfortable, yet organizations that developed internal capacity to be responsive to one another—without attempting control—were able to derive value from partners' unique assets. The study was limited by its retrospective design, small number of cases, geographic concentration in Boston, and reliance on qualitative methods intended to generate insights rather than test causal hypotheses. Findings suggest that cross-sector partnerships benefit from incremental development over long time horizons, though these insights require subsequent quantitative testing.
