The importance of collaboration and partnerships in the delivery of effective services is a notion that is well established in the literature, for example, the recent evaluation of the former Stronger Families and Communities Strategy. This article describes a partnership between practitioners and researchers. The Mental Health Community Based Program funded by the Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA), and one of the projects within this initiative, is described. A complementary research (PhD) project being undertaken by the first author (Vicki Cowling), and the processes involved in establishing the partnership and working together between agency and researcher, are then outlined.