Is your organization ready to take advantage of potential strategic partnership and restructuring opportunities? Here are five tips to start thinking ahead.

1. Build awareness and consensus about strategic choices within your organization. Your board and staff leadership may not be thinking about restructuring, whether it is your own organization approaching potential partners or another organization approaching yours. Involve board and staff leadership in thinking about what the options are (i.e., reading the restructuring article or identifying local case studies) and discussing advantages and disadvantages.
    
2. Know your own organization well. This sounds obvious, but in order to partner with others effectively, it is important that you can clearly articulate the core work of your organization. Identify your strengths and resources, as well as your needs in the type of relationship you are seeking. Doing so will help you decide who to approach and who not to approach.
    
3. Stay open to thinking beyond the obvious. Get to know organizations and leaders in other sectors of the nonprofit community. Don’t immediately dismiss other organizations; spend time getting to know them and looking for leverage points that will potentially benefit both of you. Change often brings creative opportunities that can create transformational shifts.
    
4. Be prepared for when others approach you (see tip #2). What will you do if another organization asks you to merge or to take on a program that they can no longer sustain? Make sure you understand all of the strategic choices (see tip #1) available to you and have a good process in place for assessing them.
    
5. If seeking a partnership or merger with others…don’t wait until a crisis. Don’t rush. Approach others with clear intent. Open a conversation with potential partners in a listening mode. An honest and thoughtful dialogue in the beginning—even if it takes a while—will build stronger relationships from which both organizations can benefit.

-- From ICL's The Network - February 2010. Refer to full issue for more articles on strategic restructuring options.