Risks and rewards of partner-to-partner relationships

4. Meet often and drive the agenda

Don’t let a relationship fall by the wayside and then reflect back later as to why it hasn’t progressed. If the other partner isn’t driving the agenda – then you should.

Don’t be afraid to be bossy. Someone has to be the leader of the pack or be the organised one. Ultimately, this all comes down to the individual person and is not necessarily representative of the organisation or the actual partnership.

While I haven’t been told by anyone yet, I am quite cognisant of the fact that I can potentially come off as being bossy and demanding. That comes down to my personal nature as I like to have a programmatic approach, a regular rhythm, visibility and progress. I know I have rubbed some people the wrong way as a result of this, whereas with others I have seen eye-to-eye and we’ve worked fantastically.

Sometimes it’s not your place to drive the agenda, but you can still encourage regular meetings and input into the agenda to ensure that progress is being made that suits both parties. 

5. Create a workspace that actually works

Yammer, SharePoint, Google Drive – whatever. Have a place to keep leads referred in each direction and how they turned out. Bigger organisations will have deal registration systems or sales exchange systems, but these are generally basic and only capture revenue. You need to capture more about the actual rhythm of the opportunity, the engagement and the partnership.

Yes, most partners will have a CRM solution, however, the chances of them having compatible platforms that allow information exchange is probably minimal. So while admin is the bane of most sales people’s existence, the double-handling of tracking partner-based opportunities in another system is not exactly warmly received. It is, however, necessary for both sides of maintain that visibility of who brought who what deal, what was won and lost, sales generated, where the a deal is up to, and more.

The workspace shouldn’t be just about pipeline and revenue, it should also be a place to store and share information, flyers, relevant documents (including the partnership agreements) and even potentially have a social network element to help drive conversation.

6. Think beyond yourself

This is more Relationships 101. Don’t always ask about the ‘What’s in it for me’ in every engagement. Sometimes you need to help business now to build business later.

All of the above points should help ensure that both partners are holding each other accountable, working together, and visible across what they are working on together. If you as, a partner or seller, think only for yourself, the relationship won’t work.

Loryan Strant is the founder of Melbourne-based cloud integrator Paradyne, which was No.8 in the 2013 CRN Fast50.