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| Dr. Sunny; CEO Success - Digest Group |
My objective in using the experiences I had in the partnerships that I’ve been involved in as case studies is to give my reader the opportunity of knowing what he will be up against if he chooses to go that route. In doing this, let me declare from the onset that I would not be mentioning names or sketching characters that you may recognize in this write-up.
Why? Because, firstly, I still relate with the people I have been in partnership with; even though the business relationship is no longer in place.
Admittedly, the relationships, in some cases, are not as cuddly as they were before the partnership broke up. And that is understandable.
Secondly, I’ll not be mentioning names because of one of my life’s philosophies. It is my strongly held view that when two people fall in love and then fall out of love, both of them have equal share in whatever led to the break-up; just as they are jointly responsible if the relationship had endured.
Thirdly, since my objective is to help my reader to know what is involved before he forms a Master-Mind Alliance with other like-minded people, just stating the facts as they are based on my own firsthand experience will get the job done better than opening up old wounds by referring directly or indirectly to my estranged partners.
With that said, it is important for you to understand that partnership has so many things in common with marriage. In fact I’ll go as far as saying that the similarities are so many that you could pass the two off as Siamese twins. The only major difference is that we don’t call marriage a partnership.
And if marriage is as similar to partnership as I’m postulating, then many of the things you are told to watch out for in a marriage at one of those counseling sessions at your local church before you walk down the aisle to sign the dotted lines, will also apply in the partnership you’re considering.
This may sound trite or frivolous.
But going into a partnership with someone who smokes when you don’t or womanizes (or manizes as the case may be) when you don’t, will sooner or later cause friction between the two of you. So also is forging a relationship with someone who fabricates lies, is a loafer or is covetous while you abhor these vices.
No amount of patience or tolerance on your part will prevent such partnership from breaking up sooner or later. You may be prepared to overlook these terrible vices initially. But if you manage to endure them at the time you’re still struggling to put the venture on a sound footing, these issues will become a sore point the moment the venture starts to make money.
Why is it that we go into partnerships? Obviously it is because we are not always in a position to go it alone. You have an idea but you don’t have the seed capital to turn your idea into a money making machine. So, you do what seems to be the perfect solution. You look around you to see if you can find someone who will buy into your idea and provide the cash to float the business.
Sometimes it so happens that you lack a vital skill, despite having the money and the idea to kick-start your business. For example, you are a production person; and you need someone to market your product or service. You’ve tried your best to get a suitable person but no luck.
Each time you hire a new hand that shows some promise, you discover that he’s not as good as you thought or as his curriculum vitae proclaims.
After months or maybe years of fruitless search, this guy comes on the scene. He’s so good at marketing you’re ready to bend over backwards to have him on your team.
Surely, this guy is not going to come on board as one of your staff, you say to yourself. So you propose a stake in your business as bait.
And that’s it: you’ve got yourself a partner!
It does also happen that sometimes you can’t think of starting your business alone when your childhood friend of say, twenty or thirty-something years, with whom you have shared almost everything, will be side-tracked in the new venture. So you bring him in. And on and on like that it goes.
These are only a few of the reasons why we go into partnerships. If they work well, it’s one of the best things that can happen to you. But unfortunately, they don’t always go well.
In your search for a successful partnership, let’s examine some things you shouldn’t do.
1. Don’t expect your partner to be perfect.
If truth must be told, there are no perfect human beings. Everyone of us has a fault, whether we admit it or not. However, before you get into a partnership, it’s important for you to know your prospective partner’s weaknesses and strengths.
How can you do that? Well, for me, I achieve that during the meetings we have to discuss the venture. Usually, I have a set of dos and don’ts. And I get my partner(s) to be to discuss each one of them.
During these extensive discussions, I listen intently to what the other party is saying. I look out for body language and try the best I can to interpret them. I make sure that I maintain eye contact with the other person. Your eyes reveal a lot. You can hardly hide what they are saying.
When the other party raises an objection, I patiently try to understand where he is coming from and the point he is trying to drive home.
In this process, I’m able to determine whether we have enough things in common to warrant proceeding with the partnership deal. I’ve scuttled a number of arrangements just by following these simple drills.
2. Don’t go in with the hope of changing your partner
Maybe before now, I would have taken a chance on my ability to change a prospective partner’s weaknesses that is inconsistent with my own lifestyle. But that can never happen again. Now I know enough about human frailties that I can never make such a mistake again.
For example, let’s say you are discussing with somebody you want to team up with. You agree on a few things and in your own mind, you believe those issues have been thoroughly ironed out. Then you sit down at the next meeting to thrash out other things.
As you get down to discussing these things, your partner to be takes you back to the issues you’ve agreed on earlier and starts raising fresh points on them.
When it happened the first time, you gave him the benefit of the doubt.
Then it happened again. And again. At that point, you should begin to question the ability of this other guy to stick to agreements. The Book of James gives a damning verdict on such a person. It says, a ‘double minded man is unstable in all his ways.’
Right there in front of you is such a person. You cannot sign an agreement with this person and go to bed thinking you have a deal. No you don’t. You can’t rely on any agreement you make with this person. Scuttle that arrangement as fast as you can, or you may live to regret it.
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