Assessing the Fit: Is a PPP Right for You?
Audience: General | Level: Foundational
Summary
This page outlines the types of problems for which PPPs are intended to solve and the necessary prerequisites for PPPs to be successful and will help determine if a PPP is a good match and should be further explored.
When to consider a PPP
PPPs are a collaborative mechanism that can be employed to solve problems – but there are other many mechanisms for partnering. Given that PPPs require significant amounts of time and investment to deliver their even more substantial impact, under what the conditions should a PPP be considered? It is important to consider up front whether it is appropriate to expend resources on exploring a PPP solution if other solutions would suffice.
First, consider the nature of the problem and ask yourself:
- Is this problem urgent and important enough to bring non-government stakeholders – even competitors – willingly to the table with the agency that may regulate them, and to gain and sustain their level of energy, attention, and resources that will be required over years?
- Can this problem be solved by stakeholders acting individually/independently, through lightweight cooperation or coordination, or is a PPP essential to solving the problem because it is (A) bigger than what a single entity can see or control, (B) requires a solution that does not exist elsewhere, and (C) would not be possible other than through cross-sector collaboration?
- Do the market/competitive, regulatory/social, and/or existing partner relationship dynamics favor collaboration, for example because the problem space is pre-competitive research, or in areas that are typically less directly competitive such as safety or security?
If all the above hold, then consider these PPP prerequisites:
- There must be some viable concept that mutually benefits stakeholders. In other words, the value created by partnering is distributed to both public and private partners, and there must be an attractive value proposition for each partner.
- There must be a set of motivated, committed industry leaders who see collaboration in their best interest and are willing to invest the necessary time and resources to co-design and test an initial concept.
- There must be a willing government sponsor or other trusted entity who champions, funds, and acts as a catalyst to form the partnership.
- For data-sharing PPPs, entities who own the data believe that the value to their organization and public benefit from sharing specific data outweighs the cost and risk of sharing (note that a Trusted Third Party can mitigate some concerns).
- Stakeholders must align to the mindset of rapid prototyping, iterating, and learning by doing.
