Overview

The key elements of a Shared Services Alliance are:

Community-based partnership – providers working together
Shared costs and services delivered in a more streamlined and efficient way
Cost and time savings reinvested into enhanced program quality

Shared Service Alliances in the ECE industry exist in locations across the country, and many more are emerging. Through research and lessons gleaned from existing Alliances, we have been able to build a large and growing knowledge base of effective Shared Services practices. Our annual Shared Services Technical Conference brings together from around the country existing and emerging Alliances, as well as policy makers and funders, to deepen the Shared Services knowledge base and facilitate Alliance development. Presentations from the 2010 and 2011 conferences are linked in the resources below.

General information about Shared Services can be found in the resources below. For more detailed planning and implementation tools, see Resources – Tools and Information.

Shared Services Articles, Blogs, and Presentations

Innovative Business Model Advances Quality Child Care – William Penn Foundation newsletter, January 2012

Delivering Quality: Strengthening the Business Side of Early Care and Education, by Louise Stoney and Susan Blank, September 2011

Shared Services: A New Business Model to Support Scale and Sustainability in Early Care and Education, by Louise Stoney; policy brief prepared for Early Learning Ventures, October 2009

Shared Services: A Powerful Strategy to Support Sustainability of ECE Businesses, by Louise Stoney; Exchange, September/October 2009

Shared Services: Strengthening Early Care and Education, by Louise Stoney and Libbie Naman Poppick; Communities & Banking, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, Fall 2010

Creatively Combining The Back Office: A Series on Shared Service Alliances; Part 1: Interview with John Weiser; Stanford Social Innovation Review

Creatively Combining The Back Office: A Series on Shared Service Alliances; Part 2: The Children’s Home/Chambliss Shelter; Stanford Social Innovation Review

Creatively Combining The Back Office: A Series on Shared Service Alliances; Part 3: Early Learning Ventures Alliances; Stanford Social Innovation Review

Tipping Point for a National Movement for ECE Shared Services; Stanford Social Innovation Review

Cost, Quality and Shared Services – Anne Mitchell, 2010 Shared Services Technical Conference

Outsourcing Back-Office Services in Small Nonprofits: Pitfalls and Possibilities – Management Assistance Group/Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Foundation, Executive Summary

Tax Credits for Early Care and Education: Funding Strategy for a New Economy, by Susan Blank and Louise Stoney, June 2011

The Iron Triangle: A Simple Formula for Financial Policy in ECE Programs, by Louise Stoney and Anne Mitchell

2011 National Shared Services Conference – Conference book and presentations from the New Orleans conference

2010 National Shared Services Conference – Presentations from the Philadelphia conference