If you and your business partner are stuck, the disagreement in front of you is probably not the problem. Arguments about whether to open a second site, take on debt, hire a manager or cut a product line are often downstream of something simpler and less discussed: the two of you want different things from your own lives, and the business is being asked to deliver both at once.
Fix it by getting both sets of wants onto the table, seeing where they overlap and where they do not, and then designing an arrangement that serves both. That sometimes means changing the business and occasionally means changing the partnership.
How does the drift start?
Partners are often aligned at the start by circumstance, and circumstances change.
Two people start a business at roughly the same stage of life, with roughly the same appetite for risk and roughly the same amount to prove. For a while, every decision is obvious, because both of you want the same thing: for this to work at all.
Once the business is no longer fighting for its life, the question changes from “how do we survive” to “what is this for” — and that question has two different answers, because by now one of you has small children and the other has none, or one has paid off the house and the other has just bought one, or one is energised by scale and the other has discovered they hate managing people.
Instead of saying that, partners argue that the marketing budget is too high, that the business is not investing enough, or that somebody is not pulling their weight. Those complaints are symptoms.
What are the four signs of misalignment?
Ordinary disagreement is healthy. Misalignment shows four signs.
- The same argument keeps coming back in different clothes. You settle it, and six weeks later it returns as a dispute about something apparently unrelated. Recurring arguments are often proxies.
- Decisions get slower rather than harder. There is little debate, and things drift because neither of you wants to open the bigger conversation that a real decision would force.
- You have started keeping score. You track hours worked, holidays taken and clients brought in, because the underlying deal no longer feels fair.
- You brief the team separately. When people start going to one of you for one kind of answer and the other for a different kind, they have detected the gap before you admitted it, and they are routing around it.
If three of those are true, you both need to say out loud what you now want.
How do you run the conversation?
Partners avoid this conversation because they fear it will end the partnership.
Do it deliberately. Book two hours, away from the business, with phones off. Do not do it at the end of a difficult week and do not do it in the office where one of you will be interrupted. And agree one rule before you start: this conversation is about what each of you wants, not about who has been right.
Then answer four questions, separately and in writing first, before either of you speaks.
- What do you want your working week to look like in three years? Give the hours, the days and what you are doing in them.
- What does this business need to pay you, and by when? Give a number and a date.
- What is your appetite for risk now? Would you personally guarantee a loan? Would you reinvest a good year rather than take it out?
- What would make you want to leave? This shows the boundary each of you is protecting.
Swap sheets. Read both without interrupting. Then find the overlap before you touch the gaps.
Worked example: two partners, different answers
This is an illustrative example, not a client. Two partners own a services business turning over around £600,000 with eight staff, split fifty-fifty, both drawing the same.
Partner A answers the four questions like this: four days a week within three years, £80,000, no appetite for a personal guarantee, would leave if the business got much bigger and the job became purely management.
Partner B answers: five days and happy with it, £120,000, would guarantee borrowing for the right opportunity, would leave if the business stopped growing and became a job.
Treated as design constraints, those answers have several workable solutions. A can run delivery and quality, where four days is realistic and management is not the whole job. B can run growth, which is where the appetite and the ambition already are. Drawings can be equalised for now with a written path to different levels as the roles diverge, or share of profits can begin to reflect the different contributions. Any borrowing that needs a personal guarantee is either B's alone with a corresponding return, or it does not happen — and that is decided now rather than in the moment.
Both people now know the shape of the constraint, so the next disagreement about the marketing budget is only about the marketing budget.
What if your answers are incompatible?
Sometimes the sheets come back incompatible: one wants to sell in three years and the other wants to run it for twenty; one wants to stop working weekends and the business does not currently function without them.
It is better to know now than in five years. Incompatible answers leave three options: the business changes shape so it can serve both aims, the ownership changes so the person who wants out has a route out, or the roles separate far enough that the two of you are effectively running adjacent businesses under one roof.
If it does come to one of you buying the other out, the two things that decide whether that goes well are agreeing the principle before you argue about the number, and getting proper advice on valuation and structure rather than negotiating it between yourselves over a pint.
How do you rebuild the agreement?
Whatever you conclude, write a page that says who decides what, how profit is split, how much each partner is expected to work, what happens if one of you wants out, and when you will review it.
Many partnerships have an agreement written before anybody knew what the business would become. If your formal agreement is old or was never written, update it with a solicitor while you are on good terms, when it costs less.
Then put the same conversation in the diary once a year. It takes an hour when nothing is wrong, and it follows the same discipline as 90-day planning and the monthly business review.
How does this relate to Performance on Purpose?
Partnership misalignment is a Performance on Purpose problem. Two people can be performing well, with a profitable business and happy clients, while both are on The Treadmill: high performance with no shared purpose.
The fix is to be specific about what each of you wants and arrange the business to deliver it. Leadership coaching gives you a referee when you are too close to it, and financial coaching looks at what the business can afford to pay each of you.
What to do this week
- Check yourself against the four signs. Write down what the recurring argument keeps returning as.
- Answer the four questions on your own, in writing, before you raise it.
- Book the two hours away from the office, with phones off, and not on a Friday after a bad week.
- Find the overlap first and say it out loud before you go anywhere near the gaps.
- Dig out your partnership or shareholders' agreement and read it. If it does not describe the business you now run, that is the job for this month.
- Put the annual version of this conversation in the diary before you leave the room.
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Frequently asked questions
How do I tell the difference between a normal disagreement and real misalignment?
Look at whether it repeats. A normal disagreement gets settled and stays settled, and you both move on to the next thing. Misalignment produces the same argument in different clothes every few weeks, because the thing being argued about is a proxy for something neither of you has said. Three other signals point the same way: decisions getting slower rather than harder, one or both of you keeping score on hours, holidays or clients brought in, and the team starting to brief you separately because they have worked out which of you gives which kind of answer. If three of those four are true, the disagreement in front of you is a symptom.
What if raising it makes everything worse?
The conversation feels dangerous because each person has privately guessed what the other wants, and the guess is often harsher than the truth. Leaving it makes things worse, because unspoken misalignment does not stay still: it turns into scorekeeping, then into resentment, then into a dispute about money. Reduce the risk by setting the rule before you start — this is about what each of you wants, not about who has been right — and by writing your answers down separately before either of you speaks.
Can a partnership work when two partners want different things?
Yes. Once both people know the shape of the constraint, you can design around it: split the roles so each of you is doing the work you want, adjust drawings or profit share to reflect what each is contributing, and agree in advance how anything needing a personal guarantee gets handled. If the differences are never said, every decision becomes a proxy fight. Write the arrangement down, including how profit is split and how either of you can leave, and review it once a year, with a solicitor where it changes the formal agreement.
What should the written agreement cover?
One page in plain words, covering six things: who decides what, how profit is split, how much each partner is expected to work, what happens if one of you wants out, how the business would be valued in that event, and when the two of you will review the whole thing. Many partnerships have an agreement drafted before anybody knew what the business would become, and then never look at it again. Get the formal version done properly with a solicitor while you are on good terms, when it costs less.