You have a dream, and you’re willing to work hard to achieve it. Then you realize you don’t have to go it alone—someone else has the same dream, or at least a compatible one.
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When events align like this, it is possible to turn your shared passion into a profitable partnership. But doing so is not always easy. Partnerships come with a host of entrepreneurial and interpersonal challenges. Consider the following tips for handling them effectively.
Celebrate Your Shared Passion – Learn Together
When you first enter a new business venture, it’s often been said that “you don’t know what you don’t know.” In other words, you’re facing a learning curve, and you may not yet know what topics you’ll need to learn more about.
As a partnership, it’s important to learn together. Often, partners bring separate strengths—for example, one might be deeply familiar with the industry while another specializes in finance, marketing, manufacturing, or some other necessary component.
You might have a tendency to learn separately—you each learn more about your particular role. Resist that tendency! Why?
Success may depend on learning together. Doing so can help you both cultivate and maintain your passion for your cause. Learning more about each other's roles and duties can also foster respect for one another. And, if one of you is unable to perform your duties for a time, the business will not suffer.
So, whenever possible, attend industry conferences and workshops, whether online or in-person, together. Don’t forget to include the trainings and seminars attended in your resume for future prospective clients.
Talk It Out
Experts agree that open communication is essential to business partnerships. What do you need to talk about?
In addition to defining your roles—we’ll cover that more in the next section—you should set goals and establish a mission and vision for your business. Refer back to these whenever you are making major business decisions.
Transparency is also vital in your communication. Share your perspectives, challenges, and successes with one another. Also, foster financial intimacy—openly discuss business finances (and any relevant information concerning your personal finances, for example, if you are personally funding the business or sharing business expenses).
Prioritize openness and honesty in your communications. This will engender trust. A trusting company culture will lead to better collaboration.
Finally, consider the frequency of your conversations. How often you need to talk things out and how formal the practice should be will differ with the nature of your industry and your company culture. If you work in the same physical office, you might find a short daily conference to be a good way to start the workday.
Or you might schedule weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly meetings. Take advantage of video conferencing or a local cafe if you’re geographically distant or don’t maintain a brick-and-mortar office space.
Establish Clear Roles
At the beginning of your partnership, you should clearly define each partner’s roles and responsibilities. Assign each other unambiguous job titles.
It’s easy for responsibilities to become unbalanced as business needs change—some of the original duties may cease while others crop up. Reassess your duties and the needs of the company at regular intervals. This requires the good communication discussed above and is essential to the work-life balance that we’ll talk about next.
Maintain a Work/Life Balance
Start-ups are notorious for taking over founders’ lives. To get your business up and running, you may need to work long hours and solve problems outside of regular business hours. As touched on above, you and your partner need to establish clear roles and adjust them as needed so that one partner does not become overwhelmed.
Maintaining a healthy work/life balance is even more important when your business partner is also your romantic partner or another family member. When you’re living and working from the same home, it is essential to establish boundaries and rituals that separate working hours from family time and work spaces from living spaces. Why?
When you live and work together, it’s easy to let work talk slip into dinnertime conversation. Or, you might feel that since your partner shares your passion, they’ll be okay with you checking your work email or taking non-emergency work-related phone calls during designated family times.
They might feel that they need to be “always on.” This can lead to stress and eventual burnout.
Key Takeaways
Building your dream and pursuing something you’re passionate about with a business partner can be a unique and rewarding experience. When you accept and expect that there will be challenges along the way, you’ll be better prepared and less likely to experience discouragement.
Remember to keep learning together, communicate deeply and often, establish and regularly evaluate and adjust your responsibilities, and set boundaries to maintain a healthy work/life balance. Putting forth the effort to do these things sets you, your partner, and your company up for long-term success.
