As a serial entrepreneur, I have started many a partnership. As a lawyer who has counseled many wannabe entrepreneurs on starting a business with someone else, I have worked hard to destroy their tenuous new bonds of loyalty. Why would a man try to destroy another man’s dreams?
Three reasons, the first to force wanna be partners to address the issues that neither of them want to confront: issues like why are they a good fit? Who’s going to handle the boring administration drudgery? How are they planning to buy each other out when one falls in love and wants to move to Montana for his new paramour? Where are they redundant? Where are they avoidant?
The second reason is because if I can break them up in a few conversations, it means that I have done my job. I have tested their devotion to each other and the company, and found it wanting. If I can sufficiently stress their relationship to the point where they are rethinking this venture – I have done my job and helped them avoid a much worse fate than falling apart after a couple of expensive hours with me.
And the third and final reason why I do this, is that if they sufficiently answer my interrogation and their partnership survives my strenuous efforts to find the chinks in their armor, then they are in a stronger position after having been tested. Every new partnership is going to face tests. There are stressors like erratic cash flow, unreliable client development, and the hardest of all tasks – figuring out who is going to do what, especially the tasks that no one wants to do. But if a new business has been put through the wringer, and the partners now have experience confronting each other on touchy subjects, and have begun to develop the skills to work through their problems – then I have served their long term needs well.
Everyone comes to new partnerships with unstated expectations – it’s the nature of the beast whether business, romantic or friendships. The key to developing long term relationships is to be open to communicating about the issues, and not taking everything personally. Being in partnership and learning to communicate with someone else is like breaking in a new pair of leather shoes. At first it’s all stiff and uncomfortable, it chafes in places, but over time, and battles, the relationship softens, the touchy areas become not so sensitive, the patter of conversation becomes familiar. If you’re lucky, you weather the storms of early new relationships and find ways to talk to each other, and eventually the stiffness gives way to a comfortable ease, and it would feel weird if it were not in your life.
It’s not always easy pushing new partnerships to a breaking point, but I can say from experience that for those I broke – I saved them more pain, and for those that didn’t break. I helped get them to stability quicker. It’s not easy being in partnership, but it’s worth it when you find a good one.
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