Partner Finding

A customer is facing an issue (in coastal science, policy or practice) on which expertise is not readily available and for which he is considering to start an investigation. The customer can submit this question to the National Coordination Office, which will search for colleagues in Europe:

• who are facing similar practical coastal issues, or
• who are seeking collaboration in the same field of research, or
• who can offer complementary expertise, or
• who can offer complementary expertise, or

ENCORA will set in place a new mechanism for partner finding in the European coastal community. Network ambassadors play a crucial role in the process of partner finding. The ambassadors are persons who have a broad personal network and great affinity with networking; they are well informed about what is going on in their network at any time, what are the strengths and the weaknesses, what are the threats and the opportunities. They can direct the customer to the likely most interesting contacts of their network. The network ambassadors are not necessarily the most specialised experts, but they know where specialised knowledge can be found and which initiatives might yield synergy. People with these qualities are invited to fulfil the role of ambassadors within the ENCORA network.

The search process is organised as follows: The NCO sends a search request to network-ambassadors in the own National Network, who will help to find partners with the best experience/expertise/competence. The NCO also sends a search request to NCOs in other countries where expertise on the same issue or similar issues likely exists. The NCO keeps the customer informed of the progress of the partner search. When appropriate partners are identified, the NCO explores their willingness to share knowledge/experience or to cooperate. If there are several motivated partners, the NCO proposes to form a working group (Community of Practice), which develops its own initiatives to cooperate and to progress on the question/issue at stake. The NCO asks the CoP to communicate their findings and offers to disseminate these findings in the ENCORA network.

How?

Four options

1. Address request to ENCORA Coordination Office,
2. Address request to National Coordination Office,
3. Address request to Theme Coordination Office,
4. Search through ENCORA Web Portal.