Is partnership a myth?

Myths are true. What’s that… I’m out over my philosophical skis? Alright, let’s shift from Phaedrus to Sun Tzu.

In college, I took a sales class, and we had to read “The Art of War.” We were supposed to interpret the book’s teachings as truths that governed the sales motion. At some point, a student gave their quote and interpretation… which described the buyer as the “enemy.” The professor became livid. How could we ever think our buyer was our enemy?

I won’t comment on the professor being right or wrong so much as I’ll say the message was convoluted. Why are we reading a book on the strategies of war when it’s that dangerous to apply the strategies of war to our most important relationship? Why are we tasked with “hunting” and “targeting” people who we should never see as the enemy?

For many sellers, the urge toward “partnership” with buyers feels like an unnatural crossing of borders. It feels like mental gymnastics to oscillate from “across the table” to “on the same side.” There’s a tension between best for you vs. best for me vs. best for us, and that tension makes true partnership feel like a myth… just a lofty idea that sounds good in theory, but isn’t present in practice.

“Myths are true.” The meaning behind Joseph Campbell’s claim is that the way things are is a very poor way to understand the way things should be. In fact, the way things should be should change the way they are.

Partnership matters. The most effective buyer and sellers in the world drive radical partnership and alignment with one another. They use symbols of partnership to ground the job to be done. Paths to Partnership, Mutual Action Plans, and Upfront Contracts are just a few of these extremely effective tools for driving partnership.

Since we’re delving into fauxlosophy, I want to spend the rest of our time here with the role of contracts. Much of modern philosophy centers on social contracts. Social contracts are the agreements that we make to dictate how we can live together to bring order to an otherwise chaotic world. Without them, we fall prey to diffidence and eventually are in such unending chaos that we can’t thrive- individually or collectively.

This brings us back to the contract of partnership: a buyer and seller choosing to work together, even when we’re in competition over things like payment terms and pricing because the real threat we face isn’t each other, it’s the chaos around us.

We partner because we need to work together to thrive individually and collectively, and denying that truth leads to things like 87% project failure rates and 2/3rds of sellers missing quota.

Building Sangria is risky. It’s risky to bet your company on building for the way things have to be instead of the way they look right now.

We need each other to solve the problems we need to solve. That’s the simple truth behind why partnership is essential.

True partnership may still feel like a myth, but when the alternative is believing we can continue to lose $260B/yr in failed software projects and thrive as an industry... it’s a myth much truer than our present reality.

We are built for a purpose-driven and un-changing truth: the best way to thrive together is the best way to thrive… so start thriving today and make Sangria part of your journey.