Reservations about my new business partner. How much value should I give my concerns?

[Rise and Shine]

Hey guys,

I've recently began the process of starting a business with a friend of mine. So far things are going well but I have some concerns regarding his character and difference in values which I think could cause problems down the road.

Its a long story but he has a lot of resentment for a company we both worked for and the founder of that company, he carries with him a lot of bitterness and hate and I really don't like being around that. He quit the company 6 months ago but he still regularly talks about how much he hates the founder and the company including my girlfriends best friend who currently works for the company.

I really dislike it when people carrying around bitterness, I think it poisons them and is of no use. I believe life is too short to be carrying it around. I'm worried about how this tendency to hate and be bitter will manifest in the business, he has already banned my girlfriends best friend from coming to the business or any of our events.

The cause of this bitterness I believe is a complex he has about being made to feel incompetent or inferior. He admits he hates to be made to feel like he is wrong and he is insecure around people that make him feel inferior, this was a problem when he tried to do sales at the last company. This is also a big problem for me as he wants no one else to help us in the company (no mentors, board members, advisors) due to his insecurity. This goes against my values as I want to surround myself with people who will raise me up, people who can inspire me and I can learn from. I also fundamentally believe that we should hire people who are better than we are, I can see this becoming a massive problem down the line.

We have the potential to start this company and give it a real go but I really don't feel good about the above concerns. Am I justified? Are these concerns worth putting a halt to the business before we get started properly?

Thanks for all your advice!

 

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[Lucid Tech]

It sounds like if your venture fails, you know exactly how he's going to feel (and tell everyone) about you.

It's uncommon for a disagreement to be truly one-sided with one party being completely blameless and the other party being 100% at fault. If he hates your old company that much it's likely he was at least partially to blame.

A lot of people are wary of starting businesses with a partner, for good reason. What makes him so irreplaceable that you need him in your new business?

 

[jon.a]

Your partner is damaged. Are you going to work on your business or work on him?

 

[Rise and Shine]

Its not that he is irreplaceable. I guess foolishly I approached a friend (him) and asked if he would like to be in business with me, having not seen him for 5 months I had forgotten about his bitterness and the dark sides of his personality. I'm an introvert and he is an extrovert. I thought he would be a good Yin to my Yang. So far he has been, we have put on one event, nothing serious but I cant shake the gut feeling that in the long run this isnt a good idea.

He is very much against the 'corporate' world and is very resisting whenever I try to get things organised in a 'business' fashion. Potentially because he is intimidated about potentially not knowing what he is doing and looking bad. We sort of agreed I'd handle the business aspect and he'd handle the practical but I can sense an uphill battle along the way.

I am thinking if it doesn't work with him I can maybe just go it alone. I'm not sure how much control I can happily give to another person, I want to be the one who sets the company values, culture and dictate how it operates.

Unfortunately having this conversation with him will really damage his ego, self esteem and our friendship...

 

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[Rise and Shine]

Your partner is damaged. Are you going to work on your business or work on him?

Sigh... indeed. It's a sad reality I guess. I just wanted to post here to make sure I wasn't being rash.

 

[theag]

starting a business with a friend of mine

Here's your mistake. Never do that. Sounds like the business is already broken before it even really started, so I would either get out or get him out.

 

[amp0193]

I cant shake the gut feeling that in the long run this isnt a good idea.

Your gut is always right. Always listen.

Unfortunately having this conversation with him will really damage his ego, self esteem and our friendship...

The longer you wait, the more damage it will cause.

 

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[Rise and Shine]

So yesterday I had a really honest conversation with him. I told him bringing negativity into a new company was like treading muddy feet onto a new carpet. I explained I was worried about how his inferiority complex may materialise and what it might mean when hiring new staff and I explained my own difficulty in handing over control to others. I completely laid my cards on the table and didn't hold anything back.

I went into the conversation expecting it to be the end of our business relationship but I also wanted to remain open.

I was surprised with his level of maturing and openness to everything I was saying, he responded "in an ideal world I wouldn't hate anyone and I wouldn't be carrying around this chip on my shoulder in regards to the old company we worked for but it saddens me that it is affecting you" he went on to say there is room to make things right, he wants an open door policy on the business so that anyone including my girlfriends best friend and the old founder could come to our events. He sees this as an opportunity to heal and grow and move through this.

He agrees he has an inferiority complex that goes back deep into his childhood but he says he needs 'verbal slaps' every now and again to snap him out of things, he suggested a codeword I would use that would help him take a step back and look at the situation logically rather than emotionally (if such a thing is even possible). When it came to giving over control of the business to another person and me worrying that his vision on how a business should be run might differ from mine he said that the business side of things is up to me to handle, he gives over all that control, "you bring me clients and I'll show them a good time" is the words he used. That agreement words for me as I want to work 'on the business, not in it' and he wants to work in it. He also completely agrees we should be hiring people better than ourselves.

It was a really good chat. I know we will have our difficulties over and over again but what really stuck with me is that I could have a completely honest, brutal truth conversation with him and he was able to listen and take the feedback constructively and we were able to move forward on good terms. Perhaps that alone can make up for his faults? What's more is his responses all demonstrated a 'growth mindset' rather than 'fixed mindset'.

So the business is back on. We had our first successful event last weekend and we have one planned for 29th of April and another in May.

This could be a mistake but one thing is for sure, I will learn a lot more by making this mistake than I would going back to being lost.

Also as a little extra bonus nugget which relates: Yesterday my girlfriend when giving advice to someone who wanted to leave their relationship said "the anticipation of having the difficult conversation is worse than having the actual conversation" and in the context of this I also agree.

 

[G-Man]

Your partner is damaged. Are you going to work on your business or work on him?

Repping @jon.a for this to bump it.

I know you had a good heart to heart with your bro, and probably got a little dopamine high from it, and I don't wanna denigrate that you had a deep conversation with a good friend.

That said: He has a lifestyle/thought pattern that has been established over years. It will not go away over night. You gotta ask yourself if you have the mental/emotional energy to have these sitdowns with him once a week for the next 36 months. That's 144 weeks by the way. Could that energy be used somewhere else.

You're going to take that existing dynamic and weave work stress and money into it. Think.

 

[Scot]

Some advice I saw in another partner thread.

Replace the world partnership with marriage and replace friend and partner with girlfriend.

Now, ask yourself if you want to be in that relationship.

 

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[G-Man]

Some advice I saw in another partner thread.

Replace the world partnership with marriage and replace friend and partner with girlfriend.

Now, ask yourself if you want to be in that relationship.

 

[Cwholesale]

Business is Business , Friendship is Friendship

I have always running my businesses together with my wife and the people that work for us .

One day we hired this girl that was really hungry to learn and my wife and she become good friends after a time she worked as a manager for one of our businesses and everything was very well . She worked with us for 3 years then she started to talking about opening her own business but she didnt have the money for it so we decided to make the business together as the business plan and research was solid.

BIG MISTAKE!

She become a diffrent person . lazy , never gets shit done , almost crying over every setback , We always have conflicts with her.

Glad that we signed the business agreement ( she own 30 % ) just waiting for her to get tierd of this and i will buy her out.

Anyway my advice is never do business with friends will only make you trouble.