No one ever said being an entrepreneurship is easy. It takes commitment, long hours and sometimes little reward. For the less experience a lot will be learned and hopefully great things will follow. In school they try to teach theories based on the past, but nothing can beat first had experience. The one thing that I have never heard taught in a collage business course is how to balance love and business. I guess that is a hard subject to cover or I missed that class.
We fall in love and think we have found the person we want to spend the rest of our lives with. Our first love, the business is doing good. You’re making moves and money is coming in. This is often the time when an entrepreneur is most likely to find a mate. Yes, I said first love is the business because you are married to your business when you sign those company documents. Let’s face it no one wants to be with a loser. We want to be on a winning team, but a business has its up and downs. The question becomes can the relationship survive the business?
Relationships are hard enough as they are. I know I haven’t figured it all out. Maybe one day, but I’m not holding my breath. We look to our mate for comfort and affection. We take care of each other. People often let their guard down and expose many of their problems with their mate. This can be a bad thing, but not always. It really depends on the two people in the relationship. Can the mate give sound advice? If your mate has never owned a business or been involved in a family business then they might not be the person to get advice from. The best advice comes from experience; and that is why having a mentor in business can be important. Plus people have a habit of only telling one side of the story.
In many cases keeping a relationship and a business separated is the best policy. This can be hard to do, because you want to be open with your mate. The fact is that the ups and down of the business effects your finances and indirectly your relationship. Sometimes you need to put off spending money and time with a mate to make sure that the business is gets the attention it needs. If the money is funny then going out many not be an option. Family always comes first, but family also needs to have an understanding that the business is just as important. Especially if that is how the family survives.
Now going into business with a mate can present a total different set of issue. The balance and separation of business and personal can really blur the lines. You don’t want personal issues spilling over into the business in front of employees, clients, business partners or investors. That is just bad for business. There are couples who run very successful business together, but mostly like they have establish ground rules to keep things balance between work and home.
Be with someone who is supportive.
Having a prenuptial agreement isn't a bad thing.
If you take care of the business it will take care of you.
It is not always good to share your problem; sometimes you need to figure things out yourself.