AHI operates under a unique organizational model aimed at integrating expertise and mandates across departments and institutions so as to produce more effective, efficient working relationships. These relationships might be between individuals from different disciplines working together on a team, among research organizations or research and development organizations working in collaboration, or between R&D teams and end users.

Facilitated processes and new organizational arrangements were used at multiple levels to foster shared agendas, to harmonize roles and responsibilities, and to strengthen implementation processes. At regional and national level, agendas must be negotiated with all partners to move beyond individual institutional agendas to a more shared, over-arching vision and framework. This grounds the collaboration in a strong rationale that is shared by all partners. New and evolving agendas must also be negotiated with diverse disciplines and institutions working together as AHI site teams, and with diverse local interest groups at community level. Periodic review and planning meetings at diverse levels help to identify barriers and successes in managing good working relationships, and to identify action points needed to overcome challenges that inevitably emerge through collaboration. "Partnership assessment frameworks" have been used to monitor and evaluate working relationships, and ensure attention is given to enhancing partnership quality and effectiveness. Different partnership configurations that link research to development have emerged in different sites, each with its unique strengths and weaknesses based on convergence or divergence of purpose, attention to process, mutual accountability, communication and leadership, decision-making processes, and the presence of strong interdependencies and complementarities.

Linking regional, national, site and local agendas, each with its own unique perspective and priorities, is challenging. So, how does one achieve a bottom-up process that has strategic links across the region? How does one negotiate these levels to gain appreciation between levels and actors? Years of experience and work across international, national, and local organizations of various types provides a rich set of experiences from which to draw lessons on the effective organization of working relationships to enhance impact and enable more integrated support functions to rural communities. Experience suggests that effective performance and partnerships require:

• Flexibility and patience to engage in up-front negotiations that enable agreements to be reached on the overall agenda of working together, and the operational modalities to be followed;
• Strong facilitation to give a voice to less outspoken or empowered individuals or institutions when defining agendas and reviewing progress;
• A clear definition of roles and responsibilities, and the complementarities between diverse contributors and contributions; and
• Periodic monitoring of partnerships and working relationships themselves to identify and address challenges in a timely manner.