Tireless. Kim Lorenz

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СКАЧАТЬ but these are the key points: keep in mind, if you own anything less than 50% of the entity, you do not have the ability to make the decisions. You can add your input, but if there are only two individuals and you own 49.9%, you might as well only have 1%. The controlling shareholder has the final say on all decisions.

      If you are considering entering into a partnership, it is very important to keep in mind that many people do not make great business partners, even if you have a great relationship with them. It takes hard work to keep a partnership successful, much like investing in a marriage. Due to possible differences in skill sets, one partner might need to do much more work than the other. The workloads and time spent can be defined by the skills of each partner, as well as what is required to keep the business moving forward.

      For some people, the imbalance of workload bothers them. Of course, if one partner is lazy and does not do their share of the work, that is most certainly cause for concern. But, if each person’s skill set dictates the amount of time required to do the work, and the work each partner does meets those expectations, then you expect each person will fulfill their respective responsibilities.

      Think this through, if the partnership is successful, growing, and making money for both partners, it should not matter that one partner might be required to work longer hours or travel for the company more. That is simply the result of that partner’s skills and contribution to the overall success of the entity. Both partners benefit. The main point to understand here is that every person is different. They have different skills and talents, as well as unique strengths and weaknesses. Everyone has a specific way of doing things, and often, these differences are what make up a great partnership—their weakness is your strength, and vice versa. However, sometimes these differences, if not understood or handled properly, can cause dissension and irreparable damage to the relationship.

      It has been said that one of the main reasons for a partnership failure, aside from financial reasons, is because of one of the partner’s spouses. To be successful, it is important for you to maintain a separation between your business partner and your personal relationships. You will need to have conversations and open discussions with your partner(s) about difficult business decisions, goals, finances, etc. Your spouse could never have the knowledge of all the issues from all the perspectives to make wise decisions. It is simply best to keep business conversations among the partners. Think about this: whenever someone shares a frustration or conflict with another person (such as a spouse), that person only hears one side of the story. It is impossible to understand or make a reasonable suggestion if you do not know all the facts or hear both sides of any issue. The person who hears only one side tends to support and reinforce the person giving them that one-sided story. That’s just a natural human tendency. The other party then makes a decision lacking the complete information.

      And who do you think hears these stories most often? That’s right, our spouses or significant others.

      Again, stories like this are not the normal case studies one will encounter in business school, nor read in a textbook. Most professors and business book authors do not have the real world, hands-on experience of starting or running a business, especially a partnership. They may have book smarts, and the statistics but often do not have the practical hands-on experience, or what might be called street smarts. Street smarts come from life experience. That is why you won’t be able to learn everything you need to know about running a successful business—or be successful at anything you do, for that matter—by only reading a book, watching a video, or searching the internet.

      However, you can learn some important lessons from our real-life experiences (and hopefully learn even more from our mistakes).

      John and I both agreed during that first all-nighter planning session when we decided to launch this business that we should never bring work home. What we meant by this is that we would leave our business between us. Even when it was difficult to not say anything, we both knew it could make matters worse to come home and vent to our spouses. Looking back, there was a situation that turned out to be the perfect example of why this agreement was important for the health of both our business and our marriages. We might be laughing now, but it wasn’t so funny when it happened!

      One night, my wife was livid as I drove into the driveway at 2:00 AM in a company truck. I’ll never forget her words piercing through the cold, winter night, “What is John doing?!”

      Let me paint a backstory for you before we get there.

      As you may remember, John was the one with the manufacturing skills. He purchased the retread plant equipment and was responsible for the construction and buildout of the plant as well as the ongoing retread operations. He was a generally quiet person and spoke very little. I, on the other hand, had the interpersonal skills. I was responsible for bringing in the customers—the “rainmaker” if you will. I was definitely the more outgoing of the two of us, but this was not the only difference in our skillsets, thankfully. Both of us were well-versed in operational management, we both had experience with budgeting and planning, and we were both early risers who did what it took to get the job done. My skills required more travel, time away from home, and spending time with customers at events, often in evenings.

      From the very first day our business got started, I was the one knocking on doors, making face-to-face calls on customers, trying to get companies to believe in us and use our services. We started from scratch. We didn’t have a single customer lined up the day we opened for business. That alone was daunting! That meant that somebody was required to work incredibly hard in an attempt to build a customer base. And that someone was me. The business we were able to secure, then provided John with the tires to retread in our new shop.

      Thankfully we weren’t by ourselves in the very beginning, as is the case with many startup companies. We were lucky enough to have found two great employees who helped us get off the ground. One was an administrative person to answer the phone we hoped would ring, as well as handling the paperwork on those customers we didn’t yet have. The other was a service person who would drive a truck to different customer locations, or on the road servicing equipment and mounting the tires we hoped we would sell. The truck had an air compressor and the heavy tools required to change or repair large truck tires.

      Though it was in the plan to incorporate retreading from the beginning, we had yet to find a facility for lease to build the retread plant, and we wouldn’t have a place for the first few months. The plant could only be constructed in the proper city-zoned industrial areas. Not many people are willing to rent a space to a new business with little credit established and no customers. A landlord wants to be assured the tenant will pay the rent on time. It was hard finding a landlord willing to take that risk. Remember Bill Gates and Paul Allen, who founded Microsoft? They also had real estate problems when they started! There was more than one landlord who has since regretted not taking a risk on Microsoft.

      Without a space secured yet, our business was housed in a mobile office (“job shack”) behind a warehouse in the south industrial side of Seattle. I found myself on the road early every morning, calling on potential customers in person, knocking on the doors of businesses that could be a great fit. John, on the other hand, could be found in the office at the same time. However, I would not get home until 7:00 PM most days, while John went home in the afternoons as he was out of work. Until we found a building for our retread plant, there really was not a lot for John to do. As is the case with many people, John was not comfortable walking into a company office uninvited and asking for business. So, that ball was mostly in my court.

      I could not operate the retread plant. John did not have the knowledge or experience calling on potential customers. We both had excellent skill sets, but very different; a highly-rated reason for a business to succeed.

      Having turned in my new company car when leaving my management job to start this new company, I bought a used Volvo to start making sales calls at customer locations. Most tire salespeople drove pickup trucks… not СКАЧАТЬ