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Who Are You in Bed With?
 The title question is figurative of course — it’s none of my beeswax who you are literally in bed with. But I may care a great deal about your business alliances if we’re to work together.
Case in point: a land holding partnership wants to sell a certain multimillion dollar property which is slated for development. Two development companies (we’ll call them Suitor A and Suitor B) want to buy it. Each suitor has a copy of a recent appraisal and thus submits nearly identical offers. Now the sellers must decide who gets the deal. In this case the sale goes to Suitor B, solely because Suitor A was sympathetic to a certain political cause and was publicly vocal about it. It just happened that one of the selling partners strongly opposed that cause.
Suitor A lost the deal because they were in bed with a certain advocacy group. I’ve also seen deals (and not just land deals — this includes construction contracts) that were lost because bed partners included:
- A certain Realtor®
- A certain banker
- A certain investor
- A certain contractor
- A certain subcontractor
- A certain employee
Here’s another example. An architect designs a house and considers who to hire for the structural engineering. She has worked with Engineer A before, likes him and wants to hire him for the job. So she grabs the phone book and looks him up. She is dismayed to find that he has joined forces with a certain surveying company as their in-house engineer. She’s had a bad experience with those surveyors, and figures anyone associated with them is probably of the same ilk. Convinced she’s misjudged Engineer A, she hires Engineer B.
It’s the same with general contractors and subcontractors. The reputation of your bed partners becomes your reputation.
What is the solution? I suggest not crawling into bed with any single company or affiliate, unless you’re ready and willing to inherit their legacy. Rather, let it be known that while you may suggest or recommend certain associates, subs, etc., you are not married to any of them.
In the case of political affiliations, if you contribute to any, it is generally advisable to keep that information under your hat. Your next potential client could easily be on the other side of the fence.
To summarize, you never know what motivates potential clients. It’s hard enough making it on your own — don’t let bed partners spoil your deals.
Tim Garrison of ConstructionCalc.com, is a professional engineer, author and software producer for the building industry. Send e-mail to buildersengineer@constructioncalc.com. Tim reads every one.
This column cannot be reprinted without permission from the author.
The views expressed in this article represent the personal views, statements and opinions of the author and do not necessarily represent the views, statements, opinions or policies of the National Association of Home Builders. NAHB does not necessarily endorse any of the views expressed by the author and NAHB is not responsible for any direct or indirect consequences arising out of the views expressed in this article.
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