In Austria, France, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania, and Spain, these partnerships highlight upscaling potential and successful collaboration!

The Booklet of successful B2B partnerships provides an overview of good practices of transactional partnerships already in place between Work Integration Social Enterprises (WISEs), and Mainstream Businesses (MBs). In addition to the participating countries Austria, the Netherlands, Italy and Ireland, it encompasses good practices from France, Spain, and Romania. All 19 good practices were selected in the light of ensuring upscaling potential and include a description and indicate elements leading to the successful partnership.
Download here for the full report (Dutch).

The following gives an overall breakdown of the revealed key elements:

Elements leading to successful B2B partnerships

• Regular, honest and appreciative communication comes first in implementing a successful partnership and the understanding of the shared interest in the cooperation is crucial.
• There is often no substitute for direct and personal exchange. The change of a management position can lead to difficulties thus considering human components and relationships are key.
• Based on the respective business opportunity, it is necessary for WISES to take enough time to prepare for it and to develop appropriate skills. This might range from tender development capacity to embroidery of delicate fabrics or size of warehouses..
• In addition, both sides have to be interested in joint development and learning. This includes the will to improve and the openness to accept and learn from feedback.
• It is also necessary to jointly identify common goals. This might be the aim of the MB to support work integration but might be also a common goal in terms of environmental sustainability, SDGs or the production method.
• Both sides need to be open and accept that collaboration might fluctuate in terms of order volume.
• Adapt the agreement to culture and context: It is a key factor to shape a formal or informal agreement tailored to culture and context. In the Netherlands for instance, there are more formal contracts found than in other countries. Such decisions depend not only on the national (and legal) context, but also on the sectors and people involved.

Buy WISEly

The project Buy WISEly aims at enabling work integration social enterprises (WISEs) and mainstream businesses (MBs) in involved countries to design, foster and implement transactional partnerships, including trade relationships, for sustainable buy social B2B market to respond to the several identified needs and address current shortages of the labour market by using a holistic approach.