Finding opportunities to cooperate with partners from other areas of society is a challenging undertaking. Given the multitude of local nonprofit associations and initiatives, gaining an overview is almost impossible. The question to ask is this: “Who would be a trustworthy and suitable partner?” Nonprofits, in turn, often have only limited knowledge of corporate procedures and goals, and in many cases they are fixated on donations.

Since 2006, „the Corporate Social Responsibility program of the Bertelsmann Stiftung has employed a method that originated in the Netherlands as an effective and low-threshold means of encouraging partnerships between private, public and nonprofit organizations in the local setting. Under the so-called “marketplace method,” representatives of companies and nonprofits gather at a designated location and spend about two hours together, negotiating with their counterparts about possible joint projects. This is an opportunity for companies, community institutions and schools, as well as welfare, cultural, environmental and other nonprofit organizations, to engage in informal discussions. These meetings ultimately lead to a wide variety of formal cooperation agreements.

More than 50 such marketplaces have taken place in Germany since the fall of 2006 (as of January 2009) and have produced well over 2,000 cooperation agreements.
The genius of the marketplace method lies in the fact that there are no restrictions on what the proposed cooperation between a company and a nonprofit may involve or how it is to be carried out, except for this: Money is taboo. Companies make available, free of charge, exclusively non-monetary assistance – in the form of in-kind donations (premises, vehicles, tools etc.), personnel (employee hours) and expertise (technical and professional services).

Such cooperation is highly beneficial to both sides. Company employees gain experience that they can take back with them to their regular workplaces; they expand their horizons and become more skillful at handling interpersonal situations. As for nonprofit organizations, additional resources make them better able to achieve their goals, and they gain new insights into how private industry approaches such projects. Working together builds mutual trust and social cohesion among project participants.

Further information can be found at www.gute-geschaefte.org