To Austrian Red Cross youth, while working on peer-to-peer support through a phone hot-line for youth, Time4Friends, realized the importance of creating partnerships to support their work. What could be better than to work with a master of telecommunication? That was how they deepened their partnership with Nokia, a cooperation that allows the partners to communicate their common philosophy.

"We realized that we were both working to connect people," says Claire Schocher-Döring of Austria Red Cross youth.

Time4Friends was set up to provide a channel for young people to talk to peers about school, sexuality and other issues. It is not an emergency hot-line, but the youth volunteers are in contact with the national hotline for youth, and can forward complicated calls if needed. Austrian Red Cross youth also cooperates with Nokia on Helfi, a first aid programme for children, where Nokia finances parts of the training materials. Furthermore, Nokia supports the production of the Austrian Red Cross youth magazine as well as campaign material and posters on different youth activities.

In the cooperation, the partners share the responsibilities and both sides benefit. Nokia would like to encourage young people to stay in touch, in order to prevent the increasing social isolation. With this regard, it is good for the company to be associated with an organization like the Red Cross. Austrian Red Cross gets financial help, and also additional channels to reach new target audiences. Finally, both partners wish to address young people, and to show that the private sector and nongovernmental organizations can have common values, and therefore join expertise and resources to reach their common goals.

Thanks to Claire Schocher-Döring of Austrian Red Cross youth for her valuable input to this article.