Series -- Part One: Success Principles

It's great to have a business partner when you are working from home for motivation in a some times isolated environment. But what if your business partner is your spouse?

This can be a tricky situation. You are always together and it's hard to "leave your personal problems at the door."? So what do you do? You both have a dream of being your own boss, but does that dream include working with each other? There is no one way to do it successfully but there are some key factors to look at when considering working with your spouse. I can only share with you what has worked for myself and husband, Brad. Does it come easy? Absolutely not. But for us, the rewards of being able to stay home with our children full time out way the spiritual warfare we had to go through.

Here are some success principles that have helped us succeed as both a couple and business partners - -

Planning Ahead

You may want to heed this advice from someone who never heard it herself. Plan ahead. Sit down and discuss it with your significant other. It is a big decision. Try this, each one of you sit down and write out on a piece of paper what you each want from your business, what kind of things you can each bring to the business and what you expect from a business partner. Then sit down together and share these thoughts with each other honestly. Don't bend to the other person for the sake of giving in, think about what you personally want to achieve. You can then decide together whether your goals/expectations are a match.

Balance

One thing I have learned is it's all about balance. I do have an extra advantage over my mom friends now that my husband realizes just how hard it is to be a stay-at-home parent. Working at home while being a mom with two toddlers was a great deal of stress to take on myself, so when Brad was ready to jump in, I welcomed it, sort of. It was hard after the birth of our first child, Devin, we ran into the same issues as we always did when we tried working with each other. We didn't communicate, didn't set priorities, expectations, wants and needs. It was a power struggle. But we wanted our marriage and our business together to work so we kept on and we learn how to balance our priorities every day.

Equality

Teamwork is so important when working with your spouse/business partner and that means operating on an equal level. Throw away stereotypes of the man bringing home the bacon and the woman making dinner and changing diapers. You are equal partners and share household and business tasks equally. Sit down and talk about what tasks you are going to take. Have a schedule up on a dry erase board. One word of advice, share the tasks neither of you like doing and take turns on a daily or weekly basis, that way neither of you is resenting the other. Work together, when making calls, especially in the beginning, make them together, sharing the list of leads. Ensure you each invest yourselves 100%.

Establish Personal Time and Business Time

Choose what times to work, split shifts and when to take personal time together as a couple and as a family.

When you have children, running a home based business can be difficult, especially when the little ones are not in school yet. You are all together 24/7 and toddlers and babies are so unpredictable. So many factors can come into play, like illnesses and tantrums. Set aside time of who will be taking care of the children while the other one works. You can split up the days into morning and afternoon or every other day. It's a good idea to take the children outside or to play activities outside of the home, so your other half isn't tempted to help you when things seem frazzled.

Encouragement

Support is one of the great benefits of working with your spouse. Encourage each other like you would any other business partner. Sit down and brainstorm together. Try and focus on each other's strengths instead of weaknesses. When it comes to your spouse there can be no such thing as constructive criticism. So do yourselves a favor and try to keep it to yourselves when you don't like the way the other one does something. When we first started working with each other, Brad and I got into extensive conversations about how we spoke to people on the phone. We had to learn that we each had a different approach and accepted it.

Appreciation

Appreciate what a gift it can be to be at home with your children and each other. You have a freedom most only dream of. It can be the ultimate experience to explore hidden talents and the great learning experience of working together. You are equally building a business and a home together. Most of all, have fun!