Hidden Traps for Life Partners Who Work Together

Written by Laurie Weiss, Ph.D.


You may think that it would be wonderful to be in business with your spouse, butrepparttar truth is that when life partners become business partners unspoken assumptions can cause significant problems.

Neither couple I describe knowsrepparttar 104398 other couple, but their stories are strikingly similar.

Craig and Warren are both recently retired executives. Craig’s wife, Marcy, owns and operates a website design firm. Warren’s wife, Sharon, owns an exclusive gift shop. Both businesses are successful, and each woman finds business ownership personally satisfying and rewarding. Both women requested couples coaching for similar reasons. Their husbands were interfering in their businesses.

Craig and Marcy were newlyweds. It was a long distance romance, and they both were delighted when his retirement allowed them to be together. His unspoken plan was to help her with her business so that she could work less, and they could spend more time together. Her plan, also unspoken, was to continue to develop her business in order to sell it in a few years and fund her own retirement.

Craig enthusiastically earned his certification in web design. He foundrepparttar 104399 new information fun and refreshing after years of heavy corporate responsibility. Marcy was delighted that he was busy and happy, until he started to help her with her work. She found his suggestions insulting. It was her business, she wasrepparttar 104400 expert, and she supervised many designers and negotiated profitable contracts. Now he, a novice, was trying to tell her what to do!

Warren and Sharon did talk to each other about their plans and goals. Warren felt that his expertise could be put to good use in Sharon’s business. He convinced her, against her “better judgment,” that expandingrepparttar 104401 business would create long term benefits for both of them. She decided to go along with his ideas.

They made plans together, expanded their capacity, hired several new employees, and Warren started pressuring everyone to be more productive. Sharon began to hate going to work. She had lovedrepparttar 104402 personal contact with her customers, but now she spent most of her time managing employees and trying to keep Warren calm.

Create Confidence With Your Writing

Written by Robert Warren



Whether you are writing a magazine article, composing a press release, or editingrepparttar sales copy on your website,repparttar 104397 end goal is alwaysrepparttar 104398 same - to influencerepparttar 104399 thinking, and probably actions, of other human beings. To do that, your writing must instill confidence in a mind that is inclined to doubt you.

Here are a few tips on keepingrepparttar 104400 reader on your side.

Keep your word count under control. Keep it simple and don't say any more than necessary; when you write, limit your word count fromrepparttar 104401 start. Never spend 1000 words covering ground that could have been covered in 200 words -repparttar 104402 extra material looks exactly likerepparttar 104403 useless filler it is.

Don't hedge. At all. Sometimes a writer is worried about offendingrepparttar 104404 reader, and so either avoids making direct statements or padsrepparttar 104405 statements with language designed to softenrepparttar 104406 blow. Don't hedge - be bold and direct, and letrepparttar 104407 reader be offended. You can't make everyone happy, and you'll look like a fool if you try.

Be onrepparttar 104408 lookout for language - phrases like "taken as a whole" and words like "basically" - which doesn't contribute anything towards supporting a direct claim. Weed outrepparttar 104409 hedging and get back to simple noun-and-verb statements.

Use active verb tense - avoid passive tense at all costs. Active verbs describerepparttar 104410 subject committing an action and influencing its environment ("Jim drove his car"), while passive verb clauses dislocaterepparttar 104411 subject so that it becomes secondary torepparttar 104412 predicate clause ("The car was driven by Jim"). Typically any verb clause inrepparttar 104413 "to be" family ("has been", "is being", etc.) is a passive clause.

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