"WARNING: Avoid collaboration if possible!" That’s the bright orange warning in the opening pages of a new handbook by Fund for Our Economic Future that aims to help you recognize -- and achieve -- real "col-lab-or-a-tion" and avoid "co-blab-or-a-tion".

Here are five essentials to making collaboration work, based on the actual experiences of social sector leaders, who graciously shared their insights at a May 19 meetup and happy hour devoted to partnerships at Foundation Center West.

Before successful partnerships can be established, an organization must first "Know Thyself." We have rounded up some articles that will help you know your organization better, find examples, and communicate your successful partnerships well.

How do you begin a conversation with a prospective merger partner? Jean Butzen says it's as easy as asking someone to have coffee.

The most popular section of Tuesday’s popular webinar of the same name was, not surprisingly, the “half-secret” of appealing to a sponsor, for it essentially described the anatomy of an effective collaborative grant proposal. Here's a summary plus a few other key points from Jeremy Miner's session.

Ever wondered if you can raise money through fiscal sponsorship and crowdfunding to support a creative project? Dianne Debicella and Theresa Hubbard from Fractured Atlas joined Foundation Center West to share information on how to combine fiscal sponsorship and crowdfunding to support artistic projects.

This post discusses how the Civil Marriage Collaborative (CMC), a funder collaborative, contributed to the success of the marriage equality movement. The CMC story also offers lessons about the role philanthropy can play in advocacy, and how funders can collaborate and take risks to achieve greater impact.