How Coopetition is Key to COVID-19 Response and Resilience

Tackling digital exclusion

 

Coopetition also gives charities a greater response to digital exclusion, to work together to improve digital skills in the voluntary sector and across society.

 

It is a vital response indeed. According to the charity Good Things Foundation, there are 11.3M people in the UK who lack the basic digital skills needed to thrive. This leaves them at risk of increased loneliness, financial exclusion and poor access to jobs and training.

 

Coopetition can help to deliver these digital skills to the nation. Partnerships are already being created in the voluntary to ensure charities are working together under this shared goal – improve digital skills.

 

The goal of digital inclusion partnerships in the sector should be to “unlock solutions to the challenge of digital exclusion” to ensure people “can have adequate access in the home so they can build the skills, confidence and enjoy opportunities for their future in a digital society”, according to Paul Finnis, Chief Executive of the Learning Foundation, which is part of the Digital Access for All inclusion partnership.

 

Supporting innovation

A report released in April by New Philanthropy Capital, called Collaborating for a Cause looked in detail at the advantages of setting up cause-related networks. These philanthropic partnerships bring together funding for good causes to improve the effectiveness of charities’ work.

 

Among the benefits is sharing learning and the ability to drive innovation.

 

“A network can contribute to an aggregate impact that is more than the sum of its parts,” states the report.

 

“Not only can members benefit from the knowledge and learning shared, but networks with high density may be more able to drive innovation and action by reducing duplication, directing philanthropists to funding gaps, and supporting funders to engage with complex issues that may feel too large to tackle individually. They can also facilitate coordinated action and collaboration.”

 

It adds that networks can be highly interconnected and “enable knowledge and ideas to spread quickly”.

 

Wider coopetition

 

Coopetition in the charity sector can be particularly beneficial in a crisis when broadened out across society – to also include private and public sector organisations.

 

An emerging way for charities to support each other in this way to be more resilient is through ‘mutual aid groups’. These are where charities, businesses, community groups and public sector organisations come together in local areas to deliver support and services.

 

A report by think tank New Local Government Network called Communities versus Coronavirus: The Rise of Mutual Aid this month praised the involvement of charities within these aid groups for providing essential services to communities affected by COVID-19.

 

“Mutual Aid groups’ ability to pick up the slack as charities and traditional services reorganised themselves during those crucial early weeks of lockdown has been another major success”, states the report.

 

“In terms of longer-term successes, groups have excelled at creating networks. Many have created partnerships of various forms, and with various degrees of formality, with both local government, and with charities and businesses in their areas.”

 

These wider link-ups between charities and with other sectors have been particularly pronounced in terms of digital. The report says: “Digital infrastructure and wide usage of web-based social media have been a central component of many groups’ ability to function during the lockdown.”

 

It adds that social media has been key, not just in communication, but also in delivering local services. This has included organising volunteers as well as identifying community groups to target for support. Facebook has been key in this, supplemented by private messaging platforms, such as WhatsApp, for “interaction for core members and organisers”.

 

In this way, hierarchies of involvement and decision-making can shape “the options available” to charities working in partnership.

 

There is clearly a strong appetite in the charity sector to cooperate as they meet the difficult challenges ahead.