Partnership Agreements
Partnership Agreements
The success of a business partnership is influenced by numerous personal and professional factors. If the partners are not on the same page or actively collaborate, it can create tension leading to partnership disputes. For example, partners may have differing perspectives, conflicting goals, or changing personal lives which can become a hindrance to the relationship. When partners cannot resolve the dispute between themselves and don’t have a sound partnership agreement to fall back on, it creates a very costly and damaging situation.
Our lawyers will work with the partners when things are going well to create a fair and comprehensive partnership agreement everyone agrees with. If a dispute arises later on, the agreement becomes the roadmap for a fair and equitable resolution. As the business grows and changes, our lawyers help with updating the partnership agreements to keep it relevant in a changing environment.
REPLACING DISPUTES WITH RESOLUTIONS
PROCESS
What is our process?
We want to understand what you want from your business. For transactional issues, what are the important issues that need to be addressed in the document we are drafting? For disputes, what is the desired resolution or outcome?
Step One: Understand your business
For transactional, what have the parties agreed to and has agreement been reached on all the key issues? For disputes, we need to know whether the contract addresses the issue, how it was addressed, who’s at fault, and what damages resulted.
Step Two: Outline the issue
Implement the developed plan, approved by the client, that repairs or fixes the transactional or dispute issue to reach the goals and outcomes you define as success. Each solution is personalized to the needs of individual businesses.
Step Four: Carry out the solution
For transactional, create a personalized document that addresses the issue that matches the standard of your business. For disputes, we use the contract to determine who is accountable and gather facts to fill in the contract gaps.
Step Three: Develop the plan
Common Issues
Partnership disputes become seriously damaging to many construction businesses. They can be the result of assorted factors, but ultimately, the business suffers. As business lawyers, we have experience mediating and resolving partnership disputes on various levels. We help guide communication to establish agreements that address the current problems while preparing plans for the future.
PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENTS
The key is clear communication about all the important business issues. Our experience with partnership formation and disputes enables us to guide that communication. When entering a partnership, it is important to create and enact a solid partnership agreement based on the agreements that result from those conversations.
The partnership agreement should address the different aspects of the business, such as ownership, money, employees, and dissolution, voluntary or involuntary, of the partnership. This ensures each partners’ interests and rights are protected and agreed upon so, in face of a dispute or changing circumstances, the partners can quickly resolve the issues.
Without a written partnership agreement, the partners, their families, and their employees are taking a huge risk. We like to say that as long as everyone “can play nice in the sandbox,” the agreement is not needed. When a dispute arises, though, it is too late. Each of the partners is going to be convinced the others are demanding more than they’re entitled to and the resolution is going to be difficult and costly. Many businesses don’t survive disputes when a partnership agreement doesn’t exist.