Never Do Business with Friends. This was taught to me very early in life, and, growing up in the US, I was reminded of this whenever the possibility of a friendly business relationship arose. I’d often hear people recount a terrible business story only to be told, “See, you should never do business with friends”.
And then, I moved to the Philippines…and my world turned upside down. Not only do people not quote this phrase with tiring repetition, but they make a point to actually seek out friends with whom to do business. When someone needs something here, the first thought seems to be, “who do I know?” and, more to the fact, when I hear similar horror stories of business gone wrong on this side of the world, the response is, “I know a guy who does that, you should go through him next time.” It was as if I had fallen through Alice’s rabbit hole!
I have spent many years here observing the success of the friends in business approach and wanting to assimilate yet even now, I am not quite able to quiet the voices in my head screaming “they’re friends…walk away!” I shudder to think about how many people I may have offended in my struggle to keep business and friendship separate.
What is it about Filipinos that makes them so good at using their networks and what is it about me that makes me so uncomfortable with it?
And then, slowly, the pieces started fitting together. I started recognizing the uneven emphasis we put on our relationships versus our projects/tasks. On one side of the continuum, relationships are the priority, sometimes to the detriment of the task; while on the other side of the continuum, the task rules supreme and relationships seem to fade into the background. Once I became aware of this spectrum, I couldn’t escape recognizing my (overly) task-orientated behavior. When I run, I run. I don’t chat with people and I don’t like to stop and walk. If I am running with friends, but they slow down to walk, I will keep going and hope to catch up with them again on the next loop, after all, I have a planned workout to accomplish. I’m not a conversational texter – I use the phone with purpose – to determine a meeting point, a time, a plan to talk. I will “hard close” meetings if the designated time has lapsed so that I can stay current with my daily to-do list. I just can’t help myself. All of these behaviors indicate a strong focus on accomplishing tasks.
Now let’s compare that to people are more relationship focused. These tend to be the people who run with friends and walk when they walk, creating and nurturing relationships during the task. I look at them with a kind of envious awe at their ability to quiet the voice that says, this is your morning run, so run! Meetings may be more casual and less time-bound, allowing the relationship, business and otherwise, to dictate the flow and duration of the meeting. In order to accomplish this, relationship people have usually mastered the art of minimalist scheduling to allow for more flexibility in their schedules. Oh how I envy that quality! These are also the people who can work together, curating their approach to a task to maintain a strong relationship through whatever challenges the work relationship might bring.
Unfortunately, I have discovered the hard way, that if something starts going wrong with the task, for instance we are delayed or the quality is suffering, I will chase after the achievement of the task, even if, unintentionally, I forsake the friendship in the process. If getting the job done on budget means that the supplier has to pay the shortfall, then I will insist on that, if the task appears too much for someone’s capabilities, I will take it away and re-award it; neither behavior of which keeps friendships alive, trust me! Could I / should I be softer and find compromise? Of course; in my head I know I should, but I also know that if I were to do that, every time I see the results of the project I will end up grumbling about that person’s performance. Being more flexible around the task, and prioritizing a friendship is just not something I am programmed to do (yet!?).
This is very different to the person who is accustomed to placing supreme importance on the relationship. I see in them an ability to compromise to keep everyone happy; and more importantly, an enviable ability to let go of small errors so that their friendship can survive. I’ve spoken to partners whose businesses have failed and their attitude is such that the business didn’t work, but, “hey, we still hang out!” How wonderful to have that perspective on life, to value the long term benefits of the friendship over a possibly short-lived business venture.
Can there be a happy medium in this spectrum; a place where I can work with a trusted friend and be so elegantly firm and fair in the business that I both maintain my expectations at work and my friendships? I’m beginning to think that for an A-type personality like myself, it is a like chasing a unicorn.
And so, for the time being, and until I have captured the unicorn, I will likely steer clear of business with friends recognizing that when cultures come together, there isn’t necessarily a right and a wrong way to do things, there is just the genuine way, and for me, it is to air on the side of caution and protect my friendships. In the end, I just hope that if you are my friend, and we see each other running, you will forgive the wave but join me for breakfast when the task is now to eat, and that if I choose a competitor over you for a product or a service, it’s not because I don’t like you, but rather the contrary, I may like you too much to do business with you.
Intercultural Consultant 