In an effort to react quickly and effectively to continuously changing customers’ needs and expectations while struggling to cope with the financial volatility and changing market needs, entrepreneurs of small businesses are now venturing into the realm of successful business partnerships. Entering into highly effective business relationship with other liked minded, ambitious and enterprising individuals help these entrepreneurs to strive to outmaneuver their competitors in the market while implementing effective strategies for growth of their business. The opportunity to connect with other enterprising individuals and entities that a partnership form of business organization provides is essential for enhancing the innovative capabilities of these entrepreneurs’ businesses and their overall success in the market.
Anura Leslie Perera, a renowned expert on effective business partnership can be successful emphasizes that it is essential for small-scale entrepreneurs conducting business in the twenty-first century and striving to achieve optimum operating efficiency to enter into lucrative partnerships. Creating an effective partnership culture within their business enterprises helps these entrepreneurs to foster collaboration among their individual partners. The four main advantages that inherently accrue in creating and fostering a partnership culture in small entrepreneurs’ businesses are:
- Openness;
- Creativity:
- Agility; and
- Resiliency
These four chief advantages encourage entrepreneurs of small businesses to transform their business organization from a sole proprietorship to a partnership form of business entity that impact the bottom line in terms of operating efficiency and revenue.
Smart business partners are capable of transforming an entrepreneur’s business enterprise into a highly lucrative commercial venture only when information flows freely within the business organization and individuals trust each other. The main characteristics of an effective partnership form of business entities are:
- Individuals can enter a partnership only voluntarily
It is not possible to force enterprising individuals and entrepreneurs of small businesses to enter into partnership agreements. The relationship among the individual entities become a true partnership when there is a commit to build trust, ability to identify mutual benefits and commitment to achieve specific business goals and objectives.
- Individuals consider themselves equal in power and accountability
In a partnership form of business entity, title along with authority is meaningless for the partners are they are able to delegate important tasks amongst themselves, take critical decisions together and resolve conflict situation by negotiating with one another.
- Individuals have access to and share information and knowledge
Unlike the business of a sole proprietor, in partnership form of business entity, the partners focus on achieving various tasks and business outcomes that bring together such individuals as partners in the first place. In their endeavor to achieve this, such partners have access to the same knowledge and information.
- Individual partners in a partnership are perceive as equally valuable
The formation or conversion of a small proprietorship business into a partnership results because every individual partner contributes to accomplish a specific business objectives or goals. Every partner brings something of value into the partnership, which is possible to evaluate in monetary terms and is critical to the quality of the ultimate business outcome.
Anura Leslie Perera stresses that the individual partners in this form of business entity being into their relationship with co-partners a viewpoint of abundance.