The concept of sustainability is traded as if on a global exchange market", where the opinions and practices of which option or policy is appropriate are confronted. The prevailing opinion holds that the current economic model is unsustainable. Although sustainable development as a common shared orientation is under question, the strategies for achieving it differ among key players due to existing leverage differences in available capacity to tackle the myriad of challenges ahead. Being a driving economical force (even more influential than governments), the role of modern business is of special significance.

The basic component of all democratic societies is reflected in increasing levels of responsibility for development. In this context, it is appropriate to speak of events spanning the past thirty years, and monitor strictly events in the area of quality improvement, under the influence of general management changes in the world, i.e. transfer of social responsibility with the exclusive interests of owners, shareholders and the broader interest of the influence of various individuals and informal groups, which could influence the decisions and actions of companies. Under this concept, social responsibility can be viewed as an obligation of an organisation to solve problems and take measures to promote the best interests of society and the organisation itself.

As it is concluded that partnership for sustainability is one of the key strategies of collaboration with the corporate sector, it is also increasingly recognized fact that the corporate sector can play an important role in promoting and protecting human and community development issues (Waddell, 2005).

Over time it has become obvious that a single sector approach in resolving issues has failed to deliver the best results, primarily as each sector has limited human and financial resources, but also due to competitive nature of stakeholders involved. None of sectors, even the public sector, can be held individually responsible for not resolving problems or setting social agendas (Juniper & Moore 2003).

In 1992 the UN Conference on Environment and Development (the Rio Earth Summit) placed partnerships between governments, private sector and civil society as central to achieving global sustainable development. Ros Tennyson in "Partnering Toolbook", (2004) asserts that "only with comprehensive and widespread cross-sector collaboration can we ensure that sustainable development initiatives are imaginative, coherent and integrated enough to tackle the most intractable problems." [] 

"At the World Economic Forum in 1999, UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, presented the UN Global Compact that encourages business to engage in cross-sector partnerships with the public sector and civil society in order to promote development. At the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in 2002 the need for and the importance of collaborative alliances between the three sectors was highlighted further. Partnerships as a new approach to development were put very high on the agenda" [] .

The Council of Europe established the principle of partnership as one of the requirements for accessing structural EU funds.

Cross-sector partnership opens up possibilities for introducing new concepts, especially in the area of CSR and sustainable development which are, for most stakeholders and companies in the region, quite novel and not recognized as a development option with a business potential.

Who are the stakeholders:

UNICEF believes that partnerships and participation are critical to deliver results for development. UNICEF definition of partnership is that they: "are voluntary and collaborative relationships among various parties, both public and non-public, in which all participants agree to work together to achieve a common purpose or undertake a specific task and, as mutually agreed, to share risks, responsibilities, resources and benefits." [] 

The basic concept of partnership is simple and straightforward: in identifying common ground between private, non-profit and public sectors and to combine skills and expertise of private sector with public sector’s legitimacy and knowledge of development issues. [] 

The traditional partnership of UNICEF and the corporate sector usually consists of investments in policies and programs supported by UNICEF. But, there are a growing number of companies that are interested to broaden their partnership with UNICEF and this involves a desire to be included in designing, implementation and monitoring of programs that they are part of. Their involvement means introducing possible innovation. Innovation is not possible without partnership. More inclusive steps in the direction of partnership are necessary, based on a joint analysis of the expected impact of business on UNICEF developmental activities.

Why a strategic response?

Responding to the challenge of partnerships for sustainable development in a rapidly changing world will require deep structural changes in politics, economics, society and resource management. To achieve such major changes requires countries to move towards sustainable development and to engage in debate over the best approach and measure progress. Sustainability is no longer a prefix of any single activity or field. Multidisciplinary and holistic-integrative response is nowadays a predominant approach of every serious organisation or company or public institution. Therefore, a change is unproductive if being autonomous to the strategic concept. This is a pre-conclusion to strategy, because strategy is much more than simple sum of operations and decisions regardless how successful they are at the moment. Since no developmental issue from the UNICEF agenda can be solved randomly and instantly, a long-term systematic approach is needed. Moreover, a response to rapid and unforeseen changes is advocated. Strategy matches the present to the future without jeopardising the entire practice. In a global environment there are few options as to what to do but there is for what strategy to adopt. Diversification of players, targets, instruments, goals, expertise, etc. in every field of practice turns the focus to partnerships. There is no other relationship able to bring added value to sustainability of structural changes.

2. Partnership Strategy2.1. Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to provide recommendations on approaches to improve UNICEF Serbia practices and processes on developing partnerships with private sector and to set a strategic framework for their future joint action.

2.2. Vision

Partnership is the way of doing business. Connectivity, communication and sharing goals, ideas and challenges with partners create opportunities to increase capacity. Partners bring new opportunities across the variety of expertise, experience and resources. Sharing achievements and goals in the future with partners will essentially contribute to UNICEF’s activity, dissemination and implementation of developmental measures in all spheres.

2.3. Goals

To pool different skills and experience

To increase capacity to solve problems

To broaden the perspective of partners

To increase the likelihood of projects implementation

Important factor in the success of the partnership is the synergy between the goals of the partnership and the strategic vision and goals of the individual partners.

2.4. Processes Steps

A way forward to realise UNICEF vision of its work with different partners and in its selection of the appropriate engagement modality is presented below. The Process is a synthesised study of partnership practitioners (Wilcox, 2004; Tennyson, 2004; SEED Initiative, 2009).

2.4.1. Building Partnerships

The first step is to identify partners, assess risks and rewards and conduct resource mapping. Finding the right partners usually requires a number of unofficial meetings to form general ideas to formulise the initiative and to prepare the ground for partnering.

Though UNICEF has a extensive network of private and non-profit sector partners, their choice, selection and resource mapping shows little systematic strategic planning and is often random in character. Needed is a process for indentifying suitable long run partnerships with thorough assessment of risks and rewards.

Implementation:

Initiate partnership promotion to encourage more companies to become active involved in UNICEF activities.

Create a UNICEF Partnership unit that coordinates collaboration with the private sector.

Create a data base of specific corporate profiles to facilitate risk and rewords assessment.

When key partners are identified consider the resources needed for the joint programme of work.

Create a core partnership team comprised of representatives from the different partners.

Duration: 3 months – 1 year

2.4.2. Partnering Agreements

The second step serves to: secure partners commitment, to take on interest-based negotiations and to agree on governance structure and accountability.

Long standing commitment and engagement to UNICEF partnership agreements remains a challenge. Most of the agreements and contracts were not drafted using interest-based negotiation and a participatory approach. Most are template agreements which potential partners had to fit into in order to become an official partner. Future partnerships need to address these issues and provide a framework for this participatory process. Most of the existing agreements are short of any governance issues and accountability mechanisms.

Implementation:

Partner commitment must be secured, to take on interest-based negotiations and to agree on governance structure and accountability.

The partnership officially begins with an agreed written document.

The document needs to be drafted using interest-based negotiation and a participatory approach with long term commitment and engagement to UNICEF.

Duration: 3 – 6 months

2.4.3. Managing the Partnering Course

Once agreed and signed there are new challenges to face: partnering roles, leadership, development of partnering skills and promotion of good partnering practice.

In leading, UNICEF adopts a dominant role in achieving results. Partnering roles are usually ambiguous, mixed with different expectations of each partner involved. Partnering skills in this business community are under developed, lacking management, coordination, and not creating added value through synergy and evaluation.

Implementation:

Consolidate agreements, roles, structure and procedures.

Develop and conduct partnership development skills and capacity building training (conducted internally and externally).

Organise Workshops, to present private sector partnering examples that can be used as a case study or a role model for future processes and agreements.

Duration: To become normal working practice

2.4.4. Delivering Successful Projects

Key to having well organised implementation partners is a need to produce joint goals and performance indicators, keeping to planned tasks and regularly report, review and revise methods. It is important to have a series of small successes functioning as "prototypes" of partnership. It is also essential to generate monitoring and evaluating systems that can help the process keep on track and learning from practice.

A result based organisation with benchmarks and targets UNICEF needs to improve the efficiency, productivity, impact, visibility and longevity of their private sector partner projects. Reporting needs improvement and there are also issues of monitoring and evaluating the partnership process, impacts and results and revising processes based on previous experience.

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