54 Many organisations do not know the extent of their involvement in partnerships. Some organisations maintain a database of partnership activity or carry out a partnership audit periodically. However, there is seldom an established means of identifying what resources they are committing to partnership working, or of evaluating the costs and benefits from working in a partnership. Few organisations we spoke to could tell us how many partnerships they were engaged in.
'We stopped counting when we got to 150…'
LSP manager
55 In some areas, there has been a growth in partnerships, sub-groups and meetings, often with similar terms of reference and overlapping (but not identical) membership. This has become a drain on resources and has resulted in duplication and inconsistencies. Public bodies need to improve the coordination within and between different partnerships, in order to ensure that they understand which of the mainstream services provided by their partners already help to deliver their own objectives. This should allow them to see whether proposed new initiatives will add value or simply overlap.
56 Assessing value for money involves taking account of all available evidence in order to reach a judgement. Some partnerships may involve additional costs, because the processes of negotiation and discussion are time-consuming. Others may manage to eliminate duplication of effort and expenditure. Partnerships will achieve value for money if they can achieve equal or better outcomes for less expenditure. To comprehend this requires an understanding of costs and benefits.