According to Ed Hatton, Entrepreneur’s Start-up Coach, and owner of The Marketing Director, there are a number of issues you should consider before taking on a partner, starting with what are your reasons for looking for someone to join the business?
Do you want someone to take part of your workload and provide room for the business to expand? If your plan is to expand, then what type of growth are you hoping for?
Once you have cleared this up for yourself, you should be able to determine what you need and from which source. If your goal is to expand the business by adding new services, the person you take on board should have the skills to add new services. You need to decide if the proposed partner has the right skills.
If they do, the second question is: is the interpersonal chemistry right? You will be spending a lot of time with the business partner, and many partnerships have failed because of interpersonal conflict, which could be to the detriment of the company.
When determining whether or not, and how big a share of the business to offer the partner, you should involved your accountant. Once you are happy with the agreement between yourself and your partner be sure to get it in writing while the relationship is still in its ‘honeymoon’ phase to avoid tense situations further down the line.