The next part continues the interpretation, but through the lens of program planning models in adult education. Again, three different approaches are used to illustrate different perspectives, planning issues, and roles and behaviours of partner members. In the Conceptual Programming Model, the reader is provided with a macro-level analysis of how the Business and Labour Partnership Program operated. This is followed by a discussion of the Interactive Model of Program Planning. Here, the reader can see how certain steps were taken to form a partnership and an individual workplace project. The final lens, Negotiation Model of Program Planning, provides the reader with a viewpoint of how the Business and Labour Partnership Program worked within the context of power relations. It is important to note that these six models and interpretations are not intended to assess how well the Program performed, but more to provide a variety of viewpoints that could be considered, or might be similar to the contexts of readers involved in the journey of partnership development.
This model is based on the idea that the optimal relationship in any partnership process is one that recognizes that members have needs and local realities at a particular stage and time in their organizational development (Mullinix, 2001). It also recognizes that if co-ordinated efforts and goals are to be attained, there needs to be a strategic movement along a partnership continuum. This three-phase continuum includes: pre-partnership, partnership, and Partnership. Nine dimensions or indicators of partnership relations that vary across the continuum were also identified and appear as Figure 1. These dimensions map across the partnership continuum and form a fluid matrix that may help explain the fostering of partnerships within the NLS Business and Labour Partnership Program.