One of the most important factors to consider when starting a new venture are who your partners. After studies have shown that 60% of start-ups fail due to the team (Rose, 1), it is more important than ever to make sure that you choose your partners carefully. One thing to look for in your partners is a diverse skill set. You want people who can do different tasks so that you have everything covered and don’t need to outsource work early in the process. Among a diverse skillset, studies have shone that passive skills are more important than active skills when it comes to ventures. Surprisingly, team experience is not a significant characteristic when it comes to improving performance. Instead, a collective strategic vision and passion are the more important traits to have and should be discussed with your team (Rose, 2).
Some important details that you need to discuss with your potential business partners are strategic vision, passion, risk, and equity. Before starting a venture, everyone should be hoping that the company goes in the same direction or else there will be conflict, and some people will lose the passion they had when first working. Passion is essential because there isn’t anyone actually forcing you to do the work. You drive yourself to do the work and make the company a reality. Risk is an unfortunate but necessary topic to discuss. Everyone should know, understand, and be comfortable with the fact that there is a chance the company will flop and go out of business. While equity does not have to be determined immediately, it should definitely be discussed at some point with all partners agreeing on specific amounts.
My team and I decided to go to Menchies for our teambuilding exercise. Besides eating delicious froyo, we learned a lot about each other, personal and work-related. I helped Tamar and Lilly set up a new instance of Wordpress on bergbuilds, and they told me a lot about their babysitting jobs. While this does not have much to do with our class on the surface, babysitting requires a lot of useful passive skills such as patience that are extremely handy when it comes to starting a new business. All in all, the team you choose is a critical decision regarding your venture so make sure that you get to know your team and that they fit the profile described above.