Successfully taking a seed idea, turning it into a product or service, and creating a full-fledged company relies on a variety of key decisions. Who you are taking on this ride with from the very starting is a key decision not only for the business you hope to build, but also for your life for (hopefully) many years on this journey. Your business partner can make you or break you.
Of my two co-founders of Bowery Valuation, my co-CEO Noah Isaacs and I have known each other since childhood; but it’s greater than shared summer camp memories that make our partnership work. The partnership we have established with Noah, in addition to with our third co-founder and CTO, Cesar Devers, has laid the foundation for our success to date (hopefully with even greater ones yet to come).
We accomplished a Series A funding round in January and have since doubled our worker count. We are on the verge of opening a second office and are on track to triple our revenue this 12 months. We learned a lot about what it takes to make this partnership work, which was each difficult and incredibly rewarding.
What to consider when selecting the right partner for your startup
Trust
When you are building something from scratch, it will possibly’t be overstated how essential it is to trust the people building with you. Without trust, the relationship will deteriorate, making it nearly unimaginable to create a sustainably successful company, let alone a positive worker culture.
Early on, we faced a lot of pushback about serving as co-CEOs. Questions arose: Will decisions stall? Who is responsible for what? After all, who is responsible?
Our answer was that for really essential decisions, we are able to explore multiple perspectives and really push each other’s ideas, which leads to much higher results than those made in an echo chamber without checks and balances.
When decisions require immediate response and there is no time for discussion, trust is again crucial. We know we will make this decision anytime we want to, with each other’s support.
Related: 12 keys to family business success
Complementary skills and expertise
Ideally, you’ll be wanting to find a partner who complements your skill set and brings something different to the table.
For me and Noah, this was one of the harder elements because we are quite similar. We have found that clear role definition is essential. He covers more of the quantitative elements of our product and business, while I cover more of the qualitative ones.
Overlapping skills may also be helpful when we have two meetings that require a CEO. With two people, our CEOs can literally be in two places at once. For example, one of us may meet with an investor and the other with a client. When opening latest offices, one of us can deal with the latest space, while the other takes care of order in the headquarters.
Shared vision and shared values
You and your partner should be on the same page when making all the most significant decisions regarding your business. What form of people do you would like to hire? What style of product do you would like to build? What culture do you would like to cultivate?
To achieve this synergy, it’s essential to enjoy working with this person because you’ll spend more time with them than with anyone else in your life. Communication between co-founders is paramount, and achieving this requires a true relationship.
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Being in the trenches
It’s very easy to share the good times, but it’s more essential to have the option to successfully get through the difficult times, of which there shall be many.
This is a tricky area when working with a friend, so it needs to be someone with whom you may ride out the lows and know that the friendly aspect of your relationship will at all times be there, despite the fact that it might be hard to see it. one sec. When disagreements occur at work, it’s really hard to separate them from the personal side of the relationship.
While it’s tough, it makes the bad times much less lonely and the victories much more special. Noah and I were incredibly lucky to have developed a similar friendship with Cesar, and we won’t imagine partners with whom we only connect on a business level.
There is no blueprint for creating a successful company, and it is an extremely difficult path. But there are few things more essential than finding the right people to ride with.