Here’s Why Business Relationships Are The Same As Personal

Why Business Owners Tend to do the Wrong Things

I’ve been involved in the marketing sector since the early days on the Internet. And most recently, an exciting start-up and new Social Media platform called HEARIS – sadly, my contract is drawing to a close due to investor and financial problems.

The parallels in what I do in my Professional life are surprisingly similar to how you should be behaving in your personal life though.

Here’s why and what business professionals often fail to do:

Act With Honesty

You all know if you’re deceptive, in any way, in your personal life that those relationships eventually stagnate, go backwards and fail. And fail miserably.

With over 30 years in professional business, I’ve seen dishonesty in many shapes and forms. Business owners have a strong tendency to act as the lone-gunmen, to control every facet of what’s going on around them.

The failure to recognise true loyalty in their team is the biggest (by far) oversight any business owner will and does make. Some talk of teamwork when, in reality, it’s just lip-service.

Most business owners even believe their own bull-shit which is a shame.

Lesson to Learn

Honesty is a contagious human behaviour. It will be returned 10 fold, if only you can recognise it’s value and continue to fight the good fight, in integrating it into your businesses’ core values.

Talk the talk and walk the walk.

Encourage others around you to steer you back if you stray from the path and reward them.

Have Transparent Agendas

Can you remember meeting people through your life that have lied, for their own personal gain and your eventual loss?

In the so-called dog-eat-dog business world, secret agendas are an expectation when they should be the exception to the rule.

An example of agenda honesty, on a minor scale, is my buying this site’s newsletter plugin called Wysija. Run by a great bunch of coders who have a similar outlook on helping others, just like the Magic Action Box plugin developers – who’s plugin I also bought.

I emailed them both with my agenda: they need to find a way to work together, integrate each other’s work and I’ll gain a great combination and they grow their customer base through an enhanced feature set.

My agenda was clearly stated as well as the win-win situation for them both. The rest is history since they’re now getting customers who would never have previously known about each other and I feel awesome for helping too.

Lesson to Learn

For a business owner, the concept is a simple one.
I win the game because I am transparently honest with my team … in everything I do and everything the business does. My team wins too since there’s always total transparency which translates to security, loyalty and trust.

Always Strive For Success In Others, Not Yourself

This is obvious and rarely implemented.

Flowing from the last point, success breeds success.

There’s never ever been a successful entrepreneur who hasn’t first made other around them to be successful FIRST.

Lesson to Learn

If you will care … they will dare.

Breathe and Communicate … In the Right Way

Communication is the foundation of any relationship, professional or personal.

Business owners will typically run from one thing to another, at break-neck speed. It’s their endeavour to be in all places, to control all activity.

They know what needs to happen and it’s usually only them. Your team is the most valuable asset in any organisation. Unless you empower their skills and ability, place your trust in those qualities and the outcomes then prepare yourself for your own melt-down and business collapse.

Lack of solid understanding leads to mistakes, poor results and even more demoralised team members … since they’re usually kept in the dark, through no fault of their own. As it usually turns out, blame is eventually placed on them, directly or by unconscious innuendo.

Lesson to Learn

Communication and subsequent understanding has always been a two-way street. Recognise that obvious fact and don’t keep occupying both lanes while moving in the one direction. You’re going to eventually crash into an immovable object.

Go with the right flow.

Summary

• Act With Honesty
• Have Transparent Agendas
• Always Strive For Success In Others, Not Yourself
• Breathe and Communicate … In the Right Way

Speak Your Mind, With Your Opinion

Nice to see you made it this far so here’s what you can do next:

• Do you feel disillusioned in how business owners tend to operate?
• What’s one thing you took away from my post?
• Click one of the Share buttons – your friends can then read this article too.

And thanks for reading too – Let us know your thoughts in the comments.