A “pre-nup” between partners can save your business.

by Michael S. Gottlieb

A new client told me recently that he can’t stand his business partner. “He does nothing but waste time and cause dissension in the company, yet he takes far more than his fair share of the money,” he told me, adding he feels the need to get him out of the business before he ruins the company. But my client, who was working hard to build the business, said his partner didn’t want to leave and he didn’t know how to force him out.

My client was extremely frustrated that there was no contractual mechanism in place to force a buyout. As far as he had been concerned, there was no need for such an agreement. For the first several years, the principals got along with one another, they hired numerous employees and the business was profitable. However, a few years ago, my client said his business partner effectively “checked out” of the business, rarely showing up at the office, and on those rare occasions when he did come in, he was argumentative and condescending to everyone.

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Mike Tash – VP, Customer Relations, ESS, Clarksburg

Customer Satisfaction is Found in Fixing the Customer…
and then Fixing the Problem

The system is down and the customer is having a fit. “Your system is broken and you need to get someone out here now!” said one of our restaurant customers, who called because his point of sale system was down. But we couldn’t get there right away; he was four hours away from us, and we couldn’t get someone out there for at least four hours. How many times have you or your staff been on the receiving end of a call from a customer like that? Hopefully not too many, but it happens to us all at times. Our business is a service business – no one calls us unless something is broken and when something is broken they are losing money! But fixing the issue is only half of the solution; you’ve also got to fix the customer, and in order to make the biggest impact with the customer, that needs to begin to happen within the first 30 seconds of taking the call. It’s how you handle the customer’s problem that makes the difference between great customer service and no customer service. An angry customer is in a very emotional state and the person on the receiving end must be aware of that.

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