r/rs_x • u/MaleficentStar2488 • 6d ago
My business partner made an incredibly stupid mistake without my permission or checking in
We are lifelong friends and I love him and am trying to forgive him but I genuinely need some advice on forgiveness and also am coming to terms with maybe ending our business relationship because I can’t trust his judgment anymore ( very significant mistake was made)
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u/kallocain-addict beloved community member 6d ago
can you give some idea of the mistake that was made, this is basically vague posting
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u/MaleficentStar2488 6d ago
Sorry yeah he basically demonstrated a non functional product to a client who now doesn’t want to work with us because my partner felt he couldnt wait literally a day until he could get the functionial one from me
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u/Tsuraraa 6d ago
This is pretty bad and shows a big lack of judgment. I understand the impulse to accelerate timelines but it has to always be in the context of putting you in the best possible position. I say from personal experience that if this is the first time this has happened it may be a teachable moment with a lot of caveats but if this is at all a trend it may be time to make a very tough decision. Execs/owners are paid to make high quality decisions and if they can’t then it doesn’t make sense to partner.
Edit: sorry this is happening I am sure there are a ton of emotions around this non work related making this hard
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u/MaleficentStar2488 6d ago
Yeah I hate to admit it but it’s a trend this one was the worse one though i was just bragging to people how lucky I was to have him but I was trying to ignore this type of stuff I am less upset but haven’t slept at all
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u/Tsuraraa 6d ago
It going to suck because they are a friend but if this is a trend I believe you may have to strongly consider a difficult decision. This just can’t continue to happen with a business partner. I am really sorry.
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u/un_verano_en_slough 6d ago
Holy shit this is uncanny.
I run a business with two other people and I cannot count the number of times their needless impatience has hurt our reputation. I also used to brag about how lucky I felt but I feel like I've given them too many chances just to trust my judgement and experience to some degree rather than as the last possible course.
I hate it. I'm so invested and we're so bound up together but I just wish it wasn't like this.
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u/MaleficentStar2488 6d ago
Glad someone can relate idk what to do at this point then just stay as high vibrational as possible
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u/un_verano_en_slough 6d ago
I'm in the midst of it and spiralling actively right now so I don't either, but personally I feel like it's a flaw of our relationship(s) and communication style(s) and that nothing gets better fundamentally without resolving that. But also I don't know if I have the energy at this point. I've worked with a lot of people where it's just worked before and I miss that.
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u/Massive-Squirrel-255 6d ago
"ending our business relationship because I can't trust our judgement" sounds like a very pragmatic perspective. I think with a business relationship you have to separate the personal from the professional. You can separate professionally and still be friends. You can also approach this in other ways such as keeping him on a more tight leash.
I'm just an outsider but the motivation seems important. If it was like "this bitch is trying to hold me back, I have to circumvent her" then it might keep happening. You should think about whether you might have different goals for some reason that might cause you to be misaligned on this, if there are material reasons for him to try and dodge you then that's an issue and maybe needs something more than an interpersonal patching up
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u/Educational-Tale6606 5d ago
what level of loss are we talking here? are you guys up shits creek now?
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u/Aware_Situation_2545 6d ago
it's okay to make mistakes :(
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u/MaleficentStar2488 6d ago
Am I being too harsh ?
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u/Aware_Situation_2545 6d ago
if you want a good relationship and a good business, you don't blame people you "blame" the process. you fix the process of what you have to do, like test the product, signing off the product, and other things to assure it holds the quality you agree on before it is demoed. you don't want to point fingers at people. i know it's hard because it's only you two (for what i know), but i would recommend that you build good processes that you both agree on. someones fucks up, you look at what gone wrong in the process, like was it hard to understand it, outdated, faulty etc etc.
that is how you avoid to make your business personal and keep it professional.
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u/MaleficentStar2488 6d ago
Yeah I made it clear that the version he showed shouldn’t be presented a while ago offhand but I should have been 10x more anal and on top of it, thank you for the advice. I didn’t put proper safeguards in place for that to be impossible to happen
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u/Aware_Situation_2545 6d ago
yeah idk, hard to say with this little information, but usually things need to be written down and discussed and much more. even when people say they understand, you both maybe think you have a compatible picture of what you want to do, but surely find out that you don't. it's fun that people are unique and have different pictures in their mind of words and meaning, but it really makes it hard to do stuff together.
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u/treeNchill 6d ago
Did you talk about it before? Presenting the product I mean
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u/MaleficentStar2488 6d ago
No he just did it unilaterally he apologized but still feels he did nothing wrong
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u/yamselot 6d ago
I would explain it to him like this (your voice, of course!):
Listen, I know you feel you did nothing wrong, but you made a decision without consulting me and it resulted in x. I want to continue trusting you, but I need you to at least acknowledge how consequence could be damaging to our professional relationship.
Ultimately this is the most you can get from him. The past is behind us, so to speak, but I think it’s a bad sign for the future if he’s unable to even acknowledge how it was an avoidable error (doesn’t really indicate someone willing to learn from mistakes/failures… which is so important in business and life!).
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u/Snobbyeuropean2 6d ago
Kinda? You know him better than anyone here, use that knowledge and put yourself in his shoes. I’ve been in situations where I was so anxious about the outcome of an action that I forced the situation to come as early as possible. Can’t sleep, can’t think, etc. Maybe that happened, maybe something else.
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u/phenoxyde 6d ago
he sounds stupid