There Are Many Risks And Rewards Of Working With A Partner - But Should You Take The Risks to Just Get The Rewards?

The Importance Of A Partnership

Regardless of the industry in which your business might operate, being able to have an ally, an associate, or a partner that looks out for your best interests within the format of a strategic alliance will greatly benefit your company.

A tactical partnership will give you a competitive edge and an opportunity to access a wider range of resources and expertise in the marketplace. This means that such a well-designed alliance can offer your clients a unique combination of products and services which are much more improved and with greater variety than your competition.

There Can Be Struggles To Overcome

The best benefit of a strategic partnership is often in the division of skills – where one partner delivers excellence in certain areas of business while the second partner excels in completely different business disciplines. Therefore, finding the right business partner is no easy task.  The truth is that you might even have to work through several business partners before finding the right one.

Here are a few things that can help you to succeed in this effort:

  • Find someone you genuinely like and trust. It is critical that a lot of trusts be established with the person you choose to become involved with financially.   Mistrust is very difficult to overcome and will substantially hinder positive progress in the future.
  • Find someone who shares your values. Successful partners should closely agree on certain standards of morality and behavior.  These values help guide their judgments, actions, and choices. These agreed-upon values shape their personal as well as their professional identities.   These combined values typically carry strong emotions and can influence the relationship.
  • Find someone with a complementary set of skillsSuccessful partnerships will include different (complementary) skills and expertise. The wider the range of skills, the clearer would be the division of their labor.
  • Find someone to engage in proactive conflict management. When people share a close relationship, it is wise to anticipate ways to make use of conflict management strategies.  The key to a successful partnership can be the use of proactive and strategic approaches to conflict management.

Pros

There are a lot of advantages to having a business partner:

  • Manpower A lot of work goes into the operations of a business. You need to do research, networking, development, and meet with potential investors. Therefore, you might need a partner you can trust to share the load of starting and managing the new business.
  • Evaluate Ideas  A business partner is able to help you realistically evaluate new ideas and business opportunities for potential flaws.
  • Networking  Having a partner will give you the opportunity to expand your list of contacts and multiply the number of potential clients, suppliers, investors, and mentors.

 Cons

  • Work Ethics Many entrepreneurs often consider that their partner does not share the same enthusiasm for the business.   Partners who are unable to meet deadlines or follow through with their responsibilities will quickly adversely affect the growth of the business.

Profit Sharing  If your partner does not produce more than enough increased business to justify their involvement, there will quickly arise questions about how profits should be shared between both of you.

Liability  Each person is supposed to take responsibility for whatever happens in the business.  If your partner violates any laws,  he should be held accountable and it is quite possible that you would suffer personally for his poor actions.

This article was written by SDK Hunter Consulting Group

About The Author:

Sherman Hunter and SDK Hunter Consulting Group staff consultants provide global moneymaking opportunities and proprietary strategies that quickly accelerate business activity. You may familiarize yourself with these unique concepts by visiting the SDK Hunter Consulting Group blog located at:  https://sdkhunter.com

NOTE: You have full permission to reprint this article within your website or newsletter as long as you leave the article fully intact and include the “About The Authors” resource box.

Scroll to Top