INDICADORES DE GESTIÓN DE PROCESO

Collaboration is one of the forms that relationships between NGOs and other organisations take. This term indicates a cooperative communicative relationship based on exchangeable benefits. Jamali et al. (2011) have argued that partnerships between NGOs and businesses are gaining popularity as a tool for addressing social problems, and explain that the terms ‘partnership’, ‘social alliances’ and ‘networks’ are used to describe the collaborative nature of this relationship (2011:375). However, choosing partners is never an easy task, as several considerations need to be taken into account. According to Austin and Seitanidi (2012), selecting the appropriate partnership depends largely on the potential benefits it promises, and they break down the factors that are relevant to a potential fit into shared interests and resources, and the identification of missions and motives. Such factors will help to determine whether the collaboration between these organisations will last, with the combination of good fits and adequate planning by the NGO leading to long-lasting and prosperous collaborations (Austin and Seitanidi 2012:934).

Collaborations are made with other organisations at both the local and the international levels. Collaboration with local organisations is very useful in terms of resources and connections, but collaborations with international organisations tends to produce more significant outcomes because it is considered as a westernisation tool for intervening in

women’s issues. Collaborating with local organisations provides a strong means for enhancing NGOs’ resources and capabilities. The analysis of the interview data showed that there are several reasons for cooperating with local organisations. Signing agreements is one way that NGOs and other organisations enter into agreements, and is mentioned by NGOs 2 and 3. Both NGOs have signed agreements with other companies that provide resources. For example, the manager of NGO 3 mentioned signing an agreement with a specialised institution, noting: “Each institution will offer something different – the Charity Storage will give us space for storing items, the Islamic Relief will offer clothing and Zamzam, a medical charity, will offer medicine”. A similar arrangement was noted by NGO 2, which signs agreements with institutions according to their needs. The manager explained that they have made agreements with health charities to provide them with medicine, and with employment institutions to find jobs for those in the area they were researching employment in. These NGOs have thus strategically selected companies or organisations to provide them with different resources based on their resource needs, but still restricted to allocating and receiving resources only.

Evidently due to their limited resources, NGOs reach out to other organisations through contracts and agreements in order to overcome some of these limitations. This approach provides NGOs with a sustainable source of resources, with each and every organisation or institution having different kinds of resources. This source of resources has become increasingly essential in the wake of 9/11, as donations and funds have been largely restricted by governments due to concerns that money will be provided to Al-Qaida or other extremist groups (Montagu 2010). Similarly, Thomas Parks (2008) argues that donors have shifted their provision of resources to more strategic targets post 9/11 and that, even on an individual level, people tend to be increasingly cautious about their donations.

Negotiations between NGOs and other organisations focus on what these organisations can offer and what the NGOs need. As NGO 12 explained, they cooperate with many organisations and try to coordinate among charities to exchange benefits. When asked about the kind of support they are seeking from other organisations, the manager of NGO 4 (male, early thirties) stated that they are looking for “all kinds of support – time, materials, appliances, education, health and voluntary work, such as cleaning, building, packing and distributing meals”. All these NGOs are willing to receive any kind of support offered in terms of materials, funds or volunteers. And in many cases, NGOs are forced to seek any kind of resources, not just those that fit with their strategic vision for using the relationship to attain outcomes beyond funding and receiving material resources as showed by NGOs 2 and 3.

One local organisation – the King Khalid Foundation – was mentioned by three NGOs. This is a non-profit organisation that has been reaching out to local NGOs to offer workshops, consultations and discussion sessions. This foundation is offering more strategic resources for NGOs by promoting the quality of their work unlike other partnership where the material resources are the most available The manager of NGO 5 (female, forties, conservative NGO) mentioned in passing that they have a relationship with the King Khalid Foundation, whilst the manager of NGO 10 (female, forties) has chosen it as their strategic partner. NGO 4 has been contacted by the King Khalid Foundation, and the female manager (early thirties) explained: “they have asked us to work with the national Youth Council – they are trying to empower us to do something”. The King Khalid Foundation has also offered to arrange discussion groups, and has reached out to NGO 4, where the male manager said: “We have been invited to a development discussion, but I stopped attending because there is nothing coming out of it. I would rather focus on working”. This manager thus showed little interest in engaging in the discussion session,

preferring to spend his time gaining resources to help them in their daily volunteering activities instead of listening to recycled talks about the importance of volunteering. The manager does not see an added value in going to some of the discussion groups. As Austin and Seitanidi (2012) have argued, partnerships have to be well planned to ensure that the best match is found. In the case of NGO 4, this was arguably not the case, as the King Khalid Foundation were not providing what they were seeking to get from a partnership. All the afore-mentioned NGOs briefly referred to the nature of the relationship they formed with other organisations. However, the manager of NGO 10 went further, providing a detailed explanation of how such alliances are built. She referred to this process as one of “activating partnerships”, and said that her NGO used it to seek a wide variety of resources, including execution, information and funds. This NGO has signed numerous contracts with other companies, and the NGOs help each other out by seeking partnerships. The manager provided the following examples of these partnerships:

The last Social Development forum’s recommendations were handed to different institutions: one as a grand-maker; another as a facilitator – a catalyst to gather them; one for consultancy; and a collage with their partnership with Colombia University, [through which they] have designed a Social Development Diploma having five or even six alliances is something we keen to do all the time. (Female, 40)

This manager stated that, in their effort to implement the recommendations of the forum they have organised, NGO 10 has decided to create a work-team consisting of six different organisations, using its relationship with other institutions to hand over roles and

responsibilities in order to work as a team to achieve one goal. This NGO needs sponsors for funds, consultants for planning, catalysts for recruiting people, and facilitators for execution, and they hand these different jobs to professional institutions to contribute their parts to the overall process. NGO 10 has the crucial role of organising this institutional teamwork – to coordinate between these different organisations in order to achieve the desired results, and to make this alliance successful. This approach is very similar to that adopted by NGOs 2 and 3, who also have multiple partnerships that are determined by their resource requirements (although NGO 10 appeared to be more strategic and to have a more cohesive plan for integrating all the partners in the alliance in order to achieve their goals). NGOs 2 and 3 have charitable objectives and seek resources that will provide them with immediate benefits, and are thus less strategic than NGO 10. In other words, they take whatever resources they are offered, creating a system of stable resources that is often essential for them. On the other hand, NGO 10 is selective in the partners it chooses, working towards specific goals and thus developing what Contu and Girei (2014) refer to as “true partnerships”, in which organisations work together towards a shared and mutual objective (Contu and Girei 2014:213).

The manager of NGO 10 noted that they seek consultations from colleges for planning and designing educational training programmes. Education is an acceptable arena in which to discuss women’s right for learning and knowledge (Devriese 2008), and educational institutions are one of the bodies that NGOs frequently work with. The interview analysis showed that several NGOs used colleges and universities for venues and consultation, and worked with them to provide training. NGO 9 also worked with higher education institutions, offering training for university students and providing them with speakers and advisors. NGOs 6 and 11 have worked with vocal training centres, providing certificates

for students who pass their courses. Not surprisingly, these NGOs work with educational institutes for the purpose of capacity building.

As I argued in chapter two, Saudi education continues to provide legitimate grounds for promoting female empowerment (Metcalfe, 2011). Devirese’s (2008) study on the Arabian Gulf stressed how these countries, which lack social activism, use higher education as a channel for improving women’s rights. Through higher education for women, activists use existing institutions as a tool for change instead of trying to construct new ones (Devirese 2008:84), and this approach has been and continues to be a very effective tool for advancing women’s empowerment there.

NGOs can use international relations as a mobilising tool for resources (Joachim 2003). However, in the Saudi setting, international relations are sometimes viewed with suspicion – as westernising mechanisms that are used to draw people away from their Islamic identities (Al-Sarrani and Alghamdi 2014). However, at the same time the government is influenced by the MGDs indicators and using it to promote women empowerment. Nonetheless, a number of NGOs – 6, 7, 9 and10, for instance – reported cooperating with international organisations. NGO 7 had a relationship with a French publishing company that let them participate in their book fair in France. In fact, the manager (female, fifties, religious NGO) mentioned that were reaching the international audience better through this participation and by holding their conferences abroad. Their recent conference in Turkey was a source of “huge publicity” for them, as the manager of NGO 7 put it. Similarly, a female manager from NGO 6 (fifties, religious NGO) insisted on the importance of reaching out to the international audience in order to correct stereotypes and misconceptions about Islam. Both NGOs 6 and 7 have thus reached out to international organisations and audiences to increase the impact of their mission to present Islam in a

more accurate and positive light. Both NGOs have a large local audience, but also have an interest in expanding their message to spread a good and accurate image of Islam to the world.

Interestingly, the reason that NGOs 6 and 7 had for developing relationships with international organisations was based on their goal of correcting misconceptions about Islam and promoting its values. On the contrary, NGOs 9, 10 and 12 were keener to learn from international organisations and collaborate with them in providing and undertaking research and learning. NGO 9 formed alliances with the UN and the World Bank, and one of its managers identified the nature of this alliance as research and study-based. Moreover, NGO 10 also had a strategic partnership with Booz & Company, who mention them on their website as a strategic partner (http://www.booz.com). Interestingly, the manager of NGO 10 (female, early forties) was very explicit in explaining the whole concept of partnership, and had a good understanding of the strategic value that it provides. In addition, NGO 12 adopted some of the campaigns of international breast cancer charities, promoting the wearing of the pink ribbon every October – the international month for breast cancer awareness.

This section of the analysis has thus discussed collaboration between both local and international NGOs. Cooperating with other organisations is a widespread practice among NGOs for numerous reasons, but the analysis has revealed that cooperation with local organisations is more common and widespread among the NGOs studied here. Cooperation with international organisations is comparatively weak due to a fear that associations with western organisations will not be viewed favourably.