Partner Selfishness Problem... Help Wanted

[Mr Jody Hudson]

My business partner in my real estate business is very competent in her part of our partnership but agressively selfish and demanding while taking for granted that I will go the extra mile and do FAR more than half of the work.

All of our prospective clients come from our numerous web sites and from numerous real estate forums and blogs that I post on as well as dozens of articles I have written and posted in thousands of places on the Net. I also always provide my vehicle and drive our clients which is considerable mileage in our rural area of business. She answers most of the inquirie we get from my endeavors and follows up on all of our prospects until we meet them. She does the follow-up after we meet and after we write a contract she manages all the situations to get the contract to final closing/settlement.

I do the closing, contract negotiations and problem solving, etc. - whatever requires goal oriented communications skills.

I have severe chronic spinal and joint pain and do virtually all of my 12-20 hours a day, usually 7 days a week, while lying down here and using my laptop. The pain has given me severe memory loss.

She does 1-3 hours a day, four or five days a week in her part of the job. I could hire someone to take her place but she is competent and knowledgable as well as experienced so replacing her would be expensive and it would be very difficult to replace her competence.

We split our income half and half but I spend a lot more on expenses, especially Web based expenses and transportation and communication, i.e. phones.

She is also a competitive, champion, weight lifter and also produces such events and expects me to go to some of her meets and competitions and take photos which is an all day, and for me a very high pain affair.

She had an event Saturday which she produced and she had expected me to pick up her son from school on Friday and then drive him to the meet, a two hour drive, Saturday morning.

I had almost two weeks of more pain than normal; still am; and spent almost all of the last 11 days in bed and in far more than usual pain. I told her a couple of times about this but she is very self-focused and likely did not hear or at least did not place any importance on such.

I called her Friday morning to tell her that I would not be able to help her out Friday afternoon and Saturday due to much worse pain and difficulty. She blew up at me with anger. She is still very angry and refuses to communicate.

She habitually expects, or rather demands that whatever she wants I do or give or provide for her and seldom even thanks me. She is also very resistant to any exchange for my excess expenses often flat refusing to share gas expense, etc. A typical day with a client is 100-150 miles and crawling along from house to house at slow speeds and keeping the large SUV A/C going while we are in each house costs an average of $50 to $75 each time. The most she will offer is a couple of dollars, with great grudging at that.

She uses her temper and communication stops as her weapons along with various Disparagement, Denegration and Invalidations against me. And, since she has the least emotional committment to our partnership she rules it like an abusive spouse rules a marriage.

I have spent a few hours researching (that is what lead me here) "Selfishness" and all sorts of related terms, phrases and quotations, etc. in hope of finding some intelligent advice or viewpoints on handling this situation. At this point my only solution is what an abused husband would do in an abusive marriage; just wait until it passes and walk on egg shells in hopes of extending the time to the next outbreak...

Advice Please?

[Jason S]

Jody, check your private messages (top right corner of the screen) for a response from me.

[NotesMaeve]

Here's what I would say:

1) We're going to hire an admin/accounting person and before profits are had, this person is going to write a purchase order for every expense we incur, and after that person is paid and all is taken care of, THEN we can split the profits.

2) I'd inform her, she's going to get her ass in gear. In those words: You are going to get your ass in gear and do some work, or the partnership is over. Start putting in a 40 hour week or take the next thing smoking. If she throws a fit, it's over. Money isn't everything. Replace her with someone who isn't a jerk if she can't get over herself.

3) Clarify you're business partners. Not buddies. You have pain and private issues and a life, and your personal lives really should be separate anyway if you don't like her as a person.

[Mr Jody Hudson]

I will be more tactful but still firm as soon as I am fully convinced of exactly what my final line in the sand IS. We have a settlement tomorrow, if all goes well, and afterwards I will write an article, which I have begun to research.

This is a very small community here and I will be doing business here, in this even smaller professional community for the rest of my life most likely. Therefore we will be likely to be involved somehow in business from time to time even if I force a split - which I did some years ago regarding our personal life, for the same reasons.

I have no problem "liking" her as a person... I surely don't require perfection in people in order to like them. However, I do require fairness in exchange and honorable conduct of business in those I choose to like.

I look forward to more good responses from you good folks here, please! I am still a bit to close to the trees for a good look at the forest, regarding this issue!

[Phil Parkinson]

COMMUNICATION!!!!!! xxxxx

[Mr Jody Hudson]

Communication is MY solution; as Communication IS the Universol Solvent! However, she... as so many American women are wont to be... stops, refuses and neglects communication when she is stressed.

So, I seek unique methods.

Currently, I am planning to post an article on my Blog when I am satisfied with my research and writing. I feel that with research and the clarification of my own thoughts that will be brought about by my writing; I will have changed myself, my own firm status in my area, and after that...

But my eyes and mind are bleary now and it won't be this morning.

Still, you ARE correct, as are the rest of you folks.

Still, more response please folks???

I need your help to prime my mental pump.

What have been YOUR experiences and successes?

[Brutha]

Therefore we will be likely to be involved somehow in business from time to time even if I force a split - which I did some years ago regarding our personal life, for the same reasons.

You two were together a few years ago, one a person level?
If so, what is your relationship to her son?

[Mr Jody Hudson]

Her son is very quiet and private but as much as possible I offer him as close a relationship as he would like... just because he is a good kid and has no other male adult figure that is much in his life. His father and he seem to have a very oppositional relationship.

I offer things, but he has not often accepted. I have taken him and his buddies places to do things and they have had a good time.

I think, according to two of his buddies that he likes me better than his Dad... but again he is a most private person. He has several good buddies though.

He is an avid artist, muscian and videographer and does very good work there. I try to find ways to allow him opportunities in those areas and sometimes he accepts my offers. Usually he just ignors my offers, but that seems to be his quiet way. I just smile if he ignors me.

[Nelson]

1) Find a suitable replacement for her job ahead of time that meets your expectations

2) Tell her the partnership is over is she doesn't start pulling her weight (generating leads, doing some of the closing work, meeting with clients, etc.)

3) If she gets angry, destroy your partnership and replace her with an employee rather than a partner.

It's not worth it to try and argue that shes selfish. Everyone is selfish and all she will do is take offense. Instead use your partnership as leverage. Lay down the facts and tell her to get her act together. If she deosn't comply then you need to throw her out on her ass.

[cdn2wheeler]

Long and short of it, your partner is a psychopath. Really.

Not the axe-wielding lunatic that creeps through the shrubbery and diminishes property values, but the conscience-bereft type whose narcissism knows no bounds.

You cannot afford to be associated with her.

And it makes no difference how you communicate your desire for her to pick up some of the slack. She will undoubtedly leap into a blind fury, or go completely uncommunicative, or both.

Dissolve the partnership. She can buy you out, or you can buy her out, or you can wind up the business and split the proceeds. Regardless, you don't need this in your life.

[Zukin]

She seems like a real jerk.

It sounds like you've already tried to communicate with her and didn't have any success with that. Now is the time to replace her with someone who is more dedicated.

With the recent slight downturn in the real estate business, there are more than enough competent professionals who have been temporarily displaced and who are looking for jobs. Many excellent sales professionals are available who will do her job in a much more effective and respectful way.

[Mr Jody Hudson]

I have learned the hard way over the years and have now for decades held a firm conviction that I can always change myself, my ideas, opinions, attitudes and anything spiritual or mental - at least to some degree. The technique I have found most effective is
1. Learn every possible thing I can about the thing.
2. Mentally and Spiritually take full responsibility for the thing to the best of my ability.
3.a. Change the thing by changing myself and
3.b. Change, Control and Manage the thing, step by step, and little by little according to 1.,2. and 3.a.

Sometimes the results are seemingly miraculous and sometimes less so. My results are NOT miraculous yet...

However, I have taken several positions as the leading partner in opposition to some of her opinions and held that position based upon my statements to her that my contribution is greater, more constant and more wholesome of our partnership business (without making her wrong or making less of her).

I have also continued to compliment her on the correct things she is doing as they happen and telling her with "conviction" of more things she needs to do and letting her know that I must enforce her increased contributions of time and money. I am looking for staff and have let her hear me honestly making calls without any discussion or consultation to her.

She has tightened up a bit and changed a bit for the better. Her attitude is fully corrected for now.

I am seeking staff that will work piecework rather than salary or percentage. I wonder if that will work but it did work greatly for me many years ago when I had a staff that quickly grew to 18 smart young women who learned and worked with me. I am working out a word ad that I will put out at the local Community College and to local waitresses (the beach season and high waitress income just ended this week). I am working out numerous statisitically managable and piecework valuable things that this staff can do for me such as Internet and Blog postings, picture taking, key word research and submissions for several Blog posting ideas I am forming, etc. This will surely bring in extra money.

I will find my first staff in the next week or two. I will let her know what I am doing and let her know that I will take the money from the gross income before making our split. I hope to have my Brokers License in a few days which grants me the legal lead of our partnership. I will wait to use this technique until I have official word of my Broker license.

Please continue to post as the strongly worded and well thought out input you folks are giving me, means a great deal to me as I form my new thoughts and patterns. Good Stuff; keep it coming PLEASE!!! This is a unique, interesting and first time exercise for me; asking you smart folks whom I don't really know to help me out!!! This request for help from someone I don't know (or even from someone I know) is not something I am accustomed to doing!

Thanks and please keep it up folks!

By the way; this is to some degree a situation that takes a good deal of it's thrust from the male/female roles we have in addition to our partnership roles. I REALLY NEED TO HAVE SOME INPUT FROM WOMEN PLEASE!