5 Tricks To Starting a Venture with Your Partner

By Prerna Arya, MBA, HBS Class of ’21

Should you do a start-up with your spouse or best friend? What can you do to avoid ruining both your company and your relationship? Prerna Arya grapples with these questions and shares 5 tricks to starting a venture with your partner without losing your relationship in the process. She reviews examples of when co-founder/partner relationships have worked well, and when they haven’t. Arya examines core questions, including, how did decide roles and equity splits? Did that impact their working relationships and the eventual success/failure of the company? Arya also investigates investors’ perspectives on this topic. Drawing lessons from these stories and prior studies she summarizes the dos and don’ts for future entrepreneurs.

 

Works Cited / Resources used:

• Interview with start-up founder (the main story in the video is the same as the founder interview reflection submitted earlier – names changed for this video)
• https://techcrunch.com/2020/02/14/married-co-founders-are-a-startups-secret-weapon/
• https://fortune.com/2016/02/15/entrepreneur-breakups
• https://yourstory.com/2016/12/couple-cofounder-problems-solutions
• https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/249922