Dotting The ‘I’s ...

One great way to expand your existing business or creating a new business, is to collaborate with one or more other people.

However, there some pitfalls you should try to avoid. One of which is to make sure that you're clear about your individual responsibilities and what your expectations are for the collaboration.

You may have come up with an idea and have your own objectives but has the other person got the same objectives? If you're not clear about what you want it may lead to disappointment and conflict later on.

Do you share the same values with your potential business partner? Make sure you sit down at some point and discuss what you want and how you're going to work together and who is responsible for what.

How will you handle communication between you? All very well when it’s going right but can make things extremely stressful when it goes wrong.

If you’re going to be working together for a while, take the time to create a partnership agreement so you know what's expected and what happens if it all goes wrong.

Even if you're just working on a short-term project, be clear about what you both want and put it down in writing so you both agree.

It will make any collaboration run that much more smoothly.