Chapter 7: Leadership

Numerous articles surveyed associated cross-sector social partnership (CSSP) ­performance with how the collaboration is led. The majority of studies addressing leadership raised an important question in the collaboration literature – is it more successful when a single organization takes a leadership role or when shared governance is the chosen platform? A smaller subset of studies promoted the importance of a coordination mechanism versus strong leadership (Chen & Graddy, 2010; Ritvala, Salmi, & Andersson, 2014). The success of single-sector leadership was assessed by Koliba, Mills, and Zia (2011) and McGuire and Silvia (2010), who reviewed collaborations where a government partner takes a leadership role. In an interesting study of leadership during times of change, Ivery (2010) found that the presence of a formal executive director was difficult for the collaborative partners to accept, but nonetheless was useful in propagating the necessary change. Similarly, in a study of strategic management in collaborations, Clarke and Fuller (2010) found evidence to suggest that a central authority figure was useful in leading the collaboration.