Identify stakeholders with an interest in or influence over a protection outcome.

Undertake a power analysis to understand the relationships between key stakeholders and who and what influences those with most power over protection outcomes. Use that to inform your strategy. Review and update this power analysis over time.

Understand and engage with the different mandates, strategies, priorities, and perspectives of different stakeholders. Initiate multi-sectoral and multi-disciplinary collaboration from the early stages of analysis and strategy development.

Remember that collaboration, cooperation, and coordination are not ends in themselves; focus on how the collaboration contributes to the desired protection outcomes.

Recognize that who you work with and how will be influenced by security or other risks of collaborating, levels of trust between stakeholders, the degree to which stakeholders share common protection objectives, the capacities and expertise different stakeholders can bring.

Identify what type of collaboration is possible and is most likely to be effective. Note that there is a spectrum of collaboration and collective action, from tightly coordinated relationships such as formal partnerships and consortiums through to loose commitments and interaction.