> DO YOU RESPECT YOUR PARTNER'S CAPABILITIES? - Do you have a healthy regard for what she can do? You have seen results previously achieved and you like them. At same time, does your partner respect your work? Without this respect you will not be able to collaborate.

> DO YOU HAVE A SHARED VISION AND COMMON VALUES? - Do you share same or similar goals? Do you agree on what needs to be done? Do you visualize results to be achieved in similar ways? And your values about work, selling, profit and human relations are similar?

> DO YOU TRUST YOUR PARTNER? - Without trust you will achieve nothing. You will spend more time in arguments than necessary. Trust is a must!

> CAN YOU STAND TO BE CRITIQUED? - Do you get hot under collar when your work is critiqued? Your partner must be able to critique your work just as you should be able to critique your partner's work. Good, honest give-and-take is necessary for a fruitful collaboration.

> CAN YOU SHARE THE LIMELIGHT? - Must you be top guy, or can you share credits with others? Is your ego strong enough to do this?

If both you and your partner meet these requirements, try a collaboration. Begin with something small, just to test yourselves. If you meet test, go for it.

A successful collaboration may lead to greater accomplishments and greater business success. Each of you learns and improves, and so does final product or service. Collaboration lifts all to a higher plane.

Collaboration is Wave of Future

The Internet lends itself to successful collaboration. When wireless equipment becomes more sophisticated - in a year or 2 - collaboration will be more frequent. In addition to usual voice messages, individuals will be able to use cellphones to exchange diagrams, pictures and other data they may be working on together.

In Western countries, we have been trained to be individualistic. Self-reliance is a major virtue. But in this complex world, which daily becomes more complex, there is no way any individual can be totally self-reliant as in past.

Individualism is great. But to be more productive and successful, we may need to cede a small amount of ego, so we may be able to collaborate effectively with others. Collaboration will become more and more conventional way of doing things.

I like to create a new mailbox for everyone who writes me, even if they are not placing an order. Everything they send to me I keep in their mailbox, and I separate my mailboxes into 3 categories: Finished, Present, and Possible. As a client's status changes, all I do is move mailbox. Then, when I'm looking for information on "Jane Doe's" order, all I have to do is open her particular mailbox and all her correspondence is there in one place.

3) Mark Everything: My biggest problem with clutter is that I end up with a lot of notes that have some piece of information, like a phone number, that I can't identify. It's really kind of amazing -- when we write down number or message, we just KNOW that we'll remember who it's from, but 20 minutes later, it's like we have amnesia!

The cure for this particular problem is simple -- just identify each message you jot down. You can put client's name on paper, or you can identify it by project name. In either case, be consistent with your system, and don't rely on abbreviations. And remember, you should file information as soon as you're through with it.

These tips are fairly straightforward, but it is common for us to forget them when we are pressed for time. The thing to remember, however, is that if we take time to follow these steps, we'll actually be making MORE time for ourselves in future.