Policy Adopted on 04/07/2023 and will be reviewed Q3 2025 – Revision 1.0
1. Policy Statement
This policy states the criteria for forming, managing and terminating partnerships with other organisations.
2. Reason for Policy
To ensure that partnerships are formed and managed in line with Revive Church’s mission and strategies with mutual benefits for both partnering organisations.
3. Who Should Read this Policy
- Board of Trustees
- Senior Leaders
- Operations Team
4. Resources
All policies can be found on The Way We Work – twww.revivechurch.uk
5. The Policy
Revive Church welcomes any organisation to express an interest in becoming a partner that is interested in advancing our mission, vision, and strategy. This partnership should be mutually beneficial to both sides.
Definition of ‘partnership’
“A collaborative relationship between two or more parties that have agreed to work together, that is based on trust, equality and mutual understanding, and focuses on the pursuit of common goals that cannot be accomplished by the partners on their own.”
Criteria for working with a partner organisation
To form a partnership with Revive Church, the partner should:
- Be willing and able to commit to helping Revive Church advance its mission, vision, and strategy.
- Be willing to declare its source of funding should Revive Church request this.
- Be willing to make the partnership and the report on its activities publicly available.
Please note that any potential partner whose source of funding is an organisation from which Revive Church would not accept funding under the restrictions of our Governing Document and will be subject to a higher level of scrutiny.
Before entering a formal arrangement, or even moving beyond informal discussions, any such potential partnership would require implicit approval from the Revive Church Board of Trustees. Sources of funding must not, either in reality or perception, threaten or undermine Revive Church’s autonomy, independence, or reputation.
The partner organisation and Revive Church will be required to commit to the following:
- To identify a representative from each organisation to serve as the key contact points.
- To develop and implement a plan of joint activity.
- To facilitate opportunities for members of each organisation to be involved in the partner’s activities.
- To contribute to promotion and advocacy of each organisation by linking to the other’s websites.
- To provide financial support for the attendance of meetings related to the partnership.
Exploring a potential Revive Church-wide partnership
- Informal conversation with a designated member of the Operations Team, or Revive Church contributor, to assess the likelihood of the two organisations’ potential for synergy. During these conversations, with guidance from the partnership policy, we will review joint needs, benefits, and costs for the partners.
- Revive Church’s Board of Trustees will review the assessment of joint needs, benefits, and costs, and approve or refuse the further development of the partnership, with an explanation for the decision taken.
- If the Board approves further development of the partnership, both organisations will agree to a workplan with clear roles and responsibilities; this may sometimes take the form of a Memorandum of Understanding if the relationship is going to be a long-standing and strategic partnership.
- The decision will be communicated to the senior decision-maker of the partner organisation.
- If approved, the partnership will be announced publicly on the websites of both organisations.
Role of Revive Church in developing partnerships
Evaluation of the partnership
The Operations Team member responsible, or the Board of Trustees, will evaluate, in discussion with the partner, a partnership after the first year and then every three years to determine if the partnership remains valuable to both organisations. If the partnership is determined to be in jeopardy, the partner will be notified. The partner will have three months (or another period as may have been agreed in an MoU) to discuss and negotiate with Revive Church a plan of renewed meaningful activities to revitalize the partnership; otherwise, it will be terminated.
Termination of partnership
Revive Church reserves the right to terminate any partnership for any reason at any time. Some reasons for immediate termination include, but are not limited to:
- Serious violation of the criteria for being a partner
- Misuse or misrepresentation of the quality of the partnership with Revive Church
- Unwillingness to fulfil the responsibilities they agreed to upon acceptance of the partnership
- Serious misconduct by the partner that conflicts with Revive Church’s vision, mission and principles and/or brings Revive Church into disrepute
These will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis and will be decided by the Board of Trustees