How we see the world isn’t necessarily how others see it. This is a fact of life. We expend an awful lot of time and effort trying to get other people to see things our way. Parenting is an obvious. Crucially, we must learn to accept and acknowledge that people see things differently. This isn’t always easy to do (as many parents can confirm).

When you’re a business owner or founder, the business is your story, or at least that’s how it seems. You nurture and control it. However, when you’re running your own business and you have a life partner and family, the story isn’t only about you, and this is where things get more complicated.

Same story, different POV

The term POV (point of view) comes from visual storytelling, typically films and television programmes. Screenwriters use POV to explain the context of the scene they’re writing, ie whose viewpoint it represents. Typically, this will occur as the narrative unfolds, so you would see the POV of someone following another person, say, for certain scenes.

In the real world, when POV impacts our relationships, we don’t have the same overarching perspective we do as a viewer. Because we’re protagonists rather than observers, we’re embedded in the action, and we bring our individual perspectives with us.

Here’s an example: negotiating bedtime with a child. The parent tries to set firm boundaries, while the child looks for ways to overcome them — typically entangling the parent in negotiations, such as reading one more page of a story, or having a 5 minute extension. The child is focused on deferring bedtime, the adult on enforcing it. The POVs clash. For the parent, following the established bedtime routine is imperative; for the child, the motivation is much more emotion driven. They want it because they want it.

Now put POV in a business context, where a business owner has their individual perspective on what’s going on, day to day when running a business. At the same time, their life partner will have a separate perspective. The business owner tends to see the business from the inside out, the life partner from the outside in. The story is essentially the same, but there are two sides to it.

Some business owners or founders will attempt to compartmentalise their lives, keeping business as separate from home life as possible. But if they think this ensures their life partner doesn’t have their own version of the story, then they’re mistaken.

Of course, the people close to you are aware of what’s happening in your business life — they may not get the all the details, but they’ll pick up enough from being around you to form their own opinions and conclusions.

Alternatively, the business owner needs an outlet and shares aspects of the business’s ups and downs with their life partner. Typically, this is more drip-feeding than full disclosure and is as unhelpful as compartmentalisation because it prioritises telling over listening. The other person’s POV doesn’t get aired.

The irony is often two, separate perceptions of the same story will lead each person to the same conclusion via different routes or thought processes. The rest is just noise and interference, jamming the signal. It makes sense, therefore, to be transparent from the start and treat the business as a shared aspect of life together.

The ego problem

To gain clarity, you must define your goals. This isn’t the same as setting them. First, you should ask yourself what sort of thing you see as a goal. It doesn’t have to be a conventional goal such as increasing sales or turnover or even growing the business. It could be something as basic as taking an overseas holiday or ensuring you don’t miss your children’s weekend sports activities.

These personal goals are part of how you perceive your business and the extent to which it overlaps with your daily life and personal relationships. Is the business stable enough to run without you while you’re away?

Business owners can feel paralysed when searching for the “big why” type of goal-setting questions, the existential issues. Focus instead on what feels more real, and achievable, to you.

The third side

Earlier, I highlighted the crucial difference between POV in a fiction and in real life. In fiction, we’re external observers. We can see how different perspectives contribute to the whole story. In real life, we’re far more involved. We’re inside the story, not observing it.

However, there is a way to gain a wider perspective. In this story, about business and family, there are 3 sides.

One belongs to the business owner. Another is that of their life partner or spouse. The third is a bit different. It casts an objective eye on the narrative. It isn’t so emotionally invested in the outcome. This isn’t a dispassionate, cold view, but it is a balanced one. It belongs to the adviser.

The reason why the adviser’s view is balanced boils down to one thing: context. Each of the other 2 sides to the story has its own context, but it’s not fully shared, or understood. The adviser sees the success of the business as not being separate from the success of the personal relationship between the business owner and their life partner. Rather, the business supports the success of the family.

Merging the 3 sides of the story fills in the gaps and creates clarity. Clarity enables sound decision-making. Good decisions grow the business. Business growth supports long-term life goals.

Contact me today for more details about how I can help you.