Cross-cultural partnership howto

BETA.

This template is an object around which a kind of partnership is emerging: a partnership with all of you who are helping to develop it. Please report upon your experiences and help us to smooth the path for future partnership by emailing us at [ gmail or partnership@connected-knowledge.net. ]

How To Use This Template

The cross-cultural partnership template is designed to help potential collaborators to reach understanding and agreement on the terms of their collaboration.

Partnership, in the sense we mean here, is about the relationship among collaborators. This template and the process of completing it cannot substitute for the relationship. Rather, working through the template may help you to build a productive relationship among partners by articulating your goals and modes of work. Recognizing that partners will not share all goals, the document aims to help partners to negotiate both commonalities and differences.

People might use this document in many ways: as a source of suggestions, as the framework for early conversations, or as the foundation of a partnership. If you want to formalize a partnership, we suggest that you walk through the document section by section, filling out its skeleton. While we believe that the resulting document will be legally binding if the parties wish, our emphasis is on establishing conditions under which such considerations need not arise.

This template is intended to assist in a process of dialog. We do not think the document will work if one person brings it to the others with all the blanks filled in. Real work is required to shape how a relationship is maintained. The difficulty of reaching conclusions is all the more reason to engage in the negotiation process. The process of negotiating this document may include conversations, ceremonies, or other acts entirely outside of the written document, which the writing can complement.

The template is deliberately sparse – each line has been included because it represents a significant element of the cooperative relationship around which negotiation ought to occur. Even if some of these points seem obvious, working through them line by line together and taking time to consider the implications of each section will assist in making explicit the assumptions of each party. Early disclosure and ongoing transparency are key to establishing and maintaining a sustainable relationship, promoting acceptance of difference as well as commonalities. Please don't ignore anything.

Annotations in the document provide suggestions and examples which are by no means comprehensive or exclusive but may assist parties in understanding what may be at stake. [We invite you to share additional suggestions with us.]

The sharing of value created in the course of the partnership should reflect the relative value of the contributions in the course of the partnership. Remember to consider all sources of value and all forms of benefit.

The goal of this document is not to maintain a collaboration when collaboration is no longer mutually beneficial. However, a goal of this document is that dissolution will be equitable. For that reason, you should consider the endpoints of the partnership, the conditions on which the partnership obligations terminate and its products are divided, even as you are embarking. It is our hope that the end of the formal partnership need not be the end of your productive relationship.

Partnership law, as it exists in [the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom] enforces background terms of fairness between partners: duties of loyalty, of care, of disclosure, of good faith and fair dealing. We reiterate that we do not see the value of this document in what the law will do for you in the case of disagreement, but in the process by which you negotiate and sustain agreement. Having reiterated this, it is our understanding that by signing this document you will be entering into a partnership, in which the law will imply the fiduciary duties of loyalty, care, disclosure, good faith and fair dealing among the partners.

We envision that for a productive collaboration, the partners should treat one another with respect, disclose their intentions, and act in the best interests of the partnership. U.S. partnership law imposes these duties. If you prefer, you may specify a different source of decision. As described in the template examples, these may include a tribal longhouse council, a village moot in rural New Guinea, [international arbitration provider / world forum of indigenous peoples], American Arbitration Association.

As we understand it, this document is worded such that national jurisdictions would defer and enforce the decisions of such bodies. We suggest that you send copies of this agreement to whatever third party you have chosen to adjudicate it.

Conclusion:

Once you are all happy that the template has assisted you in understanding each others' expectations, restrictions, positions, and interests, and you are happy with the wording of the document itself, we suggest that you print it out and sign it. This will not be the end of the process, by any means. We reiterate that it is the ongoing relationship, not this piece of paper, that is important.

We suggest that you revisit this agreement regularly and allow that developments in the relationship itself are reflected in amendments to the document.

FAQ [separate document]:

Who might use this document?

When and where might you consider using this document?

There are many contexts in which we hope this template might be used. Those listed here are exemplary not exhaustive.

Researchers entering into relationships with subjects. The advantages of partnership is that it is not contractual in form and therefore is negotiated and re-negotiated as an ongoing aspect of an ongoing relationship. In this sense, this is the opposite of a form contract. It will appeal to ethics committees and institutional review boards as negotiation and transparency are the essence of an ethical relationship.

Other contexts might include collaborations between artists and scientists; among artists from different cultural backgrounds; between digital and non-digital artists.

Further thoughts

1. Identification

2. Prior work Annotation: Each of the partners may have previous work that relates to the subject of the partnership agreement. Will this work be included in the terms of the partnership, used somehow in collaborative efforts, or kept separate?

3. Specific duties Annotation: All partners will accept the general obligation to work towards the best interests of the partnership. When the different partners bring different skills to the partnership or are expected to fill different roles, you may wish to spell out their differing intended contributions as specific obligations. In addition, you may wish for some obligations to continue ("survive") after the collaborative partnership ends, such as confidentiality, payment of royalties, or attribution.

4. Outcomes

5. Management Annotation: What does the partnership look like on a day-to-day basis? What kind of reporting and disclosures can help partners keep in touch with what the other(s) are doing? Consider how the partners' goals may change over time, and how the partnership should respond to those changes. We recommend periodic reviews of this document to capture changes and help partners to stay on the same page in their understanding of the relationship.

6. Breach How do you know when the partnership is not working? Standard partnership law includes failures like self-dealing -- when a partner takes for him or herself profit or an opportunity that should go to the partnership -- and lack of due care. Fill in any added specifics in the context of your partnership that would be a breach of partners' duty.

7. Remedies The law can't put a broken egg back together, but it can help to make the wronged party whole -- and sometimes being warned of the penalties for breach can help to keep a party from breaching, preserving a valuable relationship from a temporary strain. Specify any particular consequences the partners think should result from breach of the agreement.

8. Choice of law If the partners have disagreements, how do you want to resolve them? Here, you can choose both the source of law, such as community norms, ethical codes, or statutes; and the decisionmaker, such as a longhouse council, arbitration forum, or court.

9. Term and termination How long do you intend the partnership to last? Is it for a period of time, until the completion of a specific project, until a particular event, until one of the partners wants to leave, or indefinite? Consider that some of the obligations, listed above, can survive the termination of the partnership relationship.