Equal partners…

There are NO equal partnerships.  

Every client that I have the opportunity to serve, sometime during our work together, asks me what I think of their partner.  This is always a “loaded” question.  Funny, huh.

The “partner” may be their brother, their father, their sister, their cousin, their spouse, their friend, their business associate, their top producer, their “boss,” their production manager, their investment banker, their financial planner, their son, or their neighbor.  I have heard all of these and countless more.  Here’s what I tell them.

There are NO equal partnerships.

Stop looking for the ideal partner.  Stop trying to fix the one you have.  Stop focusing on the wrong half of the equation.  

This doesn’t mean that my client and their partners don’t have issues to address.  They always do, AND we always encourage them to deal with them directly.  My point is a matter of emphasis.  We emphasize that they get busy working on becoming a better partner first.  Period.

It is much easier to bubble up productive conflict with your partner when you are already pulling more than your weight, when you are carrying more than 50% of the load, when you are hitting on all cylinders, AND when your partner sees this with crystal clarity.  The last point is the point.  When your partner sees, not what you think your partner should see, not what you perceive, not what your friends and YPO buddies surmise from afar, and certainly not what other coworkers see.  When your partner sees that you are working on you, you have the green light.  Got it?

There are NO equal partnerships.

Start becoming an ideal partner.  Start carrying more than your fair share.  Start taking on the hardest jobs.  Start doing the stuff that nobody wants to do but you know needs to be done.  Start becoming an unequal partner and see what happens.  Start focusing on your half of the equation.  You will be amazed at what you might see.  Who knows, maybe your partner will even notice and ask you what’s up.  

Done so…