Search the Nework website    site map

No 80                                                                             November 2005

Survival Tips for Small Business Spouses/Partners

The second in a three part series on the things your spouse should know before you start your small business

You’ve finally made the decision to start a small business. You’re checking off all the boxes: business licenses, logos and letterheads, accountants and advisers of all sorts. But there’s one glaring omission from your ‘to do’ list – your spouse/partner.

Now that you and your spouse/partner have tackled the 300lb gorilla – money – you can relax a bit. The next item on your checklist is simply an FYI. When your partner starts a business, you automatically become employee number one. Even if your partner says otherwise or you believe otherwise, the position is an offer you can’t refuse. Knowing your roles and responsibilities in advance helps you avoid learning them by trial and error as your partner’s needs change. Your job description requests you to fulfil the roles of cheerleader, silent partner, temporary staff and annoying co-worker.

Cheerleader: This role seems obvious, but there are some nuances. Yes, you need to provide encouragement and cheer your partner on, with or without the pom-poms. However, to illustrate the nuances, think of jobs you have had and the different relationships you developed with different employees. There’s the cheerful co-worker who always smiles and sees the positive side, and maybe even brings scones or muffins on days when everyone is on a deadline or under pressure. A concerned co-worker reminds you that work is only part of your life. They ask how your weekend was or how your kids did at their last sports event. These probably aren’t close relationships, but they’re vital to keeping the workplace from becoming too cold and impersonal. Now you get to be the cheerful, concerned co-worker.

Another important type of co-worker is the respected colleague, or possibly, boss. Just like every other person, your partner wants to feel like they are improving and succeeding. However, the typical cheerleader response, "Honey, you’re so wonderful!" is too superficial to mean much. Alternatively, if you have a colleague that you respect and admire agree with your ideas in a strategy meeting, that’s approval. If your boss hands you an important project because he trusts you, or he tells you to knock off early on Friday because you’re working so hard – that’s success. Obviously, as a spouse, you can neither play the respected colleague nor the boss, but you can pay attention and recognise when your spouse does something notable. Maybe they figured out how to turn a one-time product sale into recurring revenue – that’s success. Or the business just secured a major client. Often, your spouse will be too buried in the daily struggle to succeed to notice that they just accomplished something that they should take pride in. It’s your role to remind them.

And of course, you need to remember the most important employee – the listening post. The classic image of two co-workers going out for a smoke to blow off some steam comes to mind. Your spouse is going to have frustrations of all kinds coming from all directions. As the boss, and maybe only employee, he or she can’t grab a cup of coffee with a trusted co-worker to complain about what an idiot so-and-so is. The only person they can debrief with is you. But remember, much like the therapist, you’re job is to simply listen and be supportive. Your spouse doesn’t expect you to solve the problems, they just want someone who’s willing to listen and validate their frustrations.

Silent partner: Although you wear the cheerleader costume every day, you can keep your silent partner suit shelved unless there are big decisions to be made. The silent partner operates almost like the board of directors for a regular company. Whenever the CEO – your spouse – needs to make a big decision, he or she presents it to the board. They put together a thorough proposal of their plan along with justifications, risks and related items. This is the most important responsibility of the silent partner: requiring your spouse to argue their plan and examine the risks. A small business owner constantly has to make decisions quickly without input from others. Reminding them to slow down and reflect for a moment on the major decisions is vital. Just like a board of directors, you aren’t expected to know the intricacies of your spouse’s company, but you can spot errors in logic or shaky assumptions which your spouse may have overlooked.

Temporary staff: If the silent partner is the brains, then the temporary staff is the brawn. Even though your spouse and you may initially agree on some amount of help you will give, or none at all, there will be times when you have to help, especially in the very beginning when there are very few or no employees. The tasks are often mindless minutiae, but sometimes a package really has to get to FedEx by five o’clock and you’re it. Or a newspaper advertisement triggers enough calls that you have to work the phones for a couple days. The catch is that when these things crop up, they can’t wait for your schedule to fit them in. You get to drop everything. The two keys to avoiding resentment are remembering that you want this business to succeed too and that you rarely have to be temporary staff. (If your temporary staffing is turning to permanent, check out Part 3.)

Annoying co-worker: Thinking back to the earlier list of co-workers, the one omission is the frustrating co-worker who interrupts your phone calls, strides into your office without invitation, and drops loads of work on your desk. You get to be that co-worker too even if you try not to, especially in the early days or if your spouse has a home office. This position can cause the most tension between a couple because initially it seems very counterintuitive. The tension lies in the perception. You are at home interacting with your spouse, which you absolutely have the right to do. However, your spouse is at work interacting with an annoying co-worker. When you tap on your spouse’s shoulder to let them know dinner is ready, your spouse sees a co-worker interrupting an important business call. When you get home from work and want to chat with your spouse for a few moments, he or she sees a co-worker wandering into their office without invitation and distracting them from the problem they were working on. When you want to break down chores for that week, your spouse sees someone piling more task items on the list.

This problem is purely psychological and requires a transition on both parts. You need to teach yourself that your spouse ‘goes to work’ every morning, and isn’t home until they get home – even though they’re sitting on the living room couch typing on their computer. Treat any interaction between those times like your spouse is away at an office. Would you call your spouse to decide who’s mowing the lawn Saturday? Probably not. Would you call your spouse to tell them they need to pick up the kids? Of course. Your spouse has a responsibility too; they need to clearly communicate when they are ‘at work’ and when they’re home. Maybe they set hours, or have a defined space, or verbally say something. They can’t expect you to simply ‘know’ when they are at work or not. And both of you need to understand that there is always a grey area between at work and at home because of the nature of being a small business owner.

Going from cheerleader and silent partner to temporary staff and annoying co-worker seems overwhelming. Even though there will definitely be hurt feelings and disagreements in the start, open communication and easy forgiveness will allow you and your spouse to gradually find a balance between your changing relationships. Just remember that your relationship as husband and wife is not defined by your roles as small business owner and employee.

© 2003 The Nework Centre   |   email neworknz@yahoo.co.nz

Top of the page