Social partnerships are increasingly seen as a means by which both government and non-government agencies can identify and respond to localised need. This paper reports the findings of the first phase of the project that aims to inform how best social partnerships can be formed and developed to support vocational education and training at the local level. This phase sought to identify key principles and practices that will underpin this aim, using the experiences of 10 existing social partnerships. A key finding was the importance of partnership work. This is detailed through five dimensions of partnership work, and principles and practices that were identified and verified as most likely assisting the development and transformation of social partnerships over time. The dimensions of 'partnership work' comprise (i) cultural scoping work; (ii) connection building work; (iii) capacity building work; (iv) collective work, and (v) trust building work. The principles manifest with subtle differences at the initial and later stages of partnership work, include developing and maintaining: (i) shared goals; (ii) relations with partners; (iii) capacity for partnership work; (iv) governance and leadership, and (v) trust and trustworthiness. The specific implications for VET will be explored in the next phase of this project.