April 7, 2022 by Dymphna

How NOT to enter a joint venture deal

Sometimes trust is just a way of avoiding responsibility.

There’s a saying in the Muslim part of the world that goes, “Trust in Allah, but tether your camel first.”

I love this one.

To me its saying, yes, trust in abundance or spirit or whatever you want to call it, but don’t think that that trust absolves you of responsibility.

Responsibility comes first.

I see this all the time with people who go into joint ventures. They get together with their mates or with their family, and put a lot of time and money into a deal.

And they think, “Oh, we don’t need to get a contract or put anything in writing. We’re best mates. We’re family. What can go wrong.”

And then things go pear-shaped.

The deal starts to fall apart, and people realise that don’t have an agreement in place about how to work things out.

And they realise that different people had completely different ideas about what they were signing up to.

And before you know it, not only have they lost a lot of money in a deal, they’ve also lost a friendship or connection with a loved one.

And you can make your money back. It’s much harder to win a loved-one back who feels betrayed and screwed over.

So tether your camel first. Sure, it’s great that you have a huge amount of trust in your joint venture partner. It’s great you have someone you want to deals with. That’s awesome. Lean into that trust.

But tether your camel first. Get everything down on paper. Get a contract in place. Get clear on what you’re actually doing.

Hopefully you don’t need it. But every now and again you do.

And the really interesting thing for me is that people feel that getting something down on paper undermines trust. Like it says to the other person that you don’t trust them.

But having everything down and clear makes it much easier to trust someone. It’s like swinging with a safety net. It frees you up and allows you to trust in the process.

When you have a clear agreement in place, it allows you to open up to your faith in others and your trust in the abundance of life. You can open up because you know you’re arse is covered.

So take the responsibility on.

Tether first, trust second.

There’s wisdom in that.

DB.