Ready, Set, Launch!

I spent the morning in a meeting with two very successful CEO’s of different companies, each with their own lawyer.

Their companies have a number of areas where they are one another's competition. I know it sounds like it could be really bad (especially when I said there were lawyers involved), but it was a blast.

The two CEO’s are forming a new joint venture company to take advantage of a field of opportunities of which each of them are nibbling on the edge. Together, they have what it takes to recreate this tired, old industry into something new and exciting. They both had bad experiences with partnerships and were very partnership-shy (understandably so) and they wanted to be deliberate in their creation of this business.

We spent a good portion of time going over the organizational structure of the business and how they will get out of the business (never start a business partnership without figuring out how you will get out of it in a nice clean way. Business partnerships aren’t a “till death do us part” proposition).

I love when I am involved in the launch of something-- a new creation-- where the founders aren’t all starry-eyed and dreamy, but both have been down some really rough roads before in the launching of business, and they are now ready to create something in the right way with a lot of hard questions being asked and answered up front.

By the way, the lawyers in the room were excellent. They added a lot to the conversation. It is good having lawyers who do their best to figure out what you are trying to do and then guide you in the best way to make your idea a reality while guiding you past some potential pitfalls. Lawyers have a sometimes deserved reputation of being deal killers who try to protect you to the point of immobilizing you. These guys where examples of how lawyers should be in my humble, but very accurate, opinion.

I come out of meetings like that jazzed up… have I mentioned lately that I really love what I do?

"Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is a progress. Working together is a success." -Henry Ford

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Ready... Set... Launch! For more information, visit my page Who & Why or send me an email at sethgetz@gmail.com.