Built Not Born Podcast · 3 November 2023
Episode 6: Has Working in Business Together as Husband and Wife Affected Our Relationship?
Chris and Helen discuss the realities of running a business as husband and wife, including trust, role boundaries, decision making, interruptions, disagreements and why finding their own lanes made working together easier.
Episode guide
About this episode
What happens when the person you share your home with is also the person you share business decisions, customers, deadlines and team pressures with? In this episode, Chris and Helen Butler talk openly about how working together as husband and wife has affected their relationship and what they have learned from building a business side by side.
They explain that the early stages were harder because both of them crossed into each other's areas and had not yet worked out where their individual strengths were most useful. Over time, clearer responsibilities helped them find a better rhythm. Rather than trying to approach every task in the same way, they learned to respect different working styles and give each other more space to lead in the areas that suit them best.
Decision making is a recurring theme. Chris and Helen discuss confidence, accountability and the temptation to question a decision once somebody else has taken responsibility for it. Their conversation shows how useful it can be to challenge each other's thinking, while also recognising when constant second guessing starts to make working together harder.
They also talk about the practical boundaries needed when a couple works in the same environment. One person may want to share updates and talk through the day, while the other may be concentrating on accounts, editing or another task that needs uninterrupted focus. Learning when to talk, when to give each other space and when to park a disagreement until later has become part of how they work.
For Chris and Helen, the biggest positive is the trust that comes from knowing the other person is fully invested in both the business and the relationship. They feel working together has strengthened their respect for each other's abilities and given them a better appreciation of what each person contributes. They are also clear that it is not a model that works for every couple, and that protecting the relationship matters more than forcing a business arrangement that is causing damage.
Alongside the main conversation, the episode includes the usual unfiltered moments from Mr & Mrs In Business, including behind-the-scenes discussion about testing podcast and video-production equipment, the Team Chris versus Team Helen tea-or-coffee debate and a customer shout-out to the college bistro they had recently visited.
Key takeaways
What you'll learn
- Working with a spouse became easier once Chris and Helen stopped crossing over so much and gave each other clearer areas of responsibility.
- Trusting a partner's strengths can make decisions and day-to-day business pressures easier to manage, even when their working styles are very different.
- Disagreement is part of working together, but they try to avoid letting work tension spill into home life or become personal.
- Focused work sometimes needs boundaries, especially when one person wants conversation and the other needs uninterrupted time for demanding tasks.
- Chris and Helen believe running a business together has ultimately brought them closer, while recognising that working with a partner is not the right fit for every couple.
- Their early experience of starting with no customers and a low-cost printer reinforced their belief that a business can be built gradually without starting with a large budget.
Questions from this episode
Frequently asked questions
Can working with your spouse strengthen a relationship?
Chris and Helen say that, in their experience, working together has brought them closer once they found a rhythm and learned to respect each other's strengths. They also acknowledge that the same arrangement will not suit every couple.
How do Chris and Helen manage disagreements when working together?
They try to keep work disagreements from becoming personal, avoid creating unnecessary tension in front of the team and return to difficult conversations later when needed. They also rely on clearer areas of responsibility to reduce repeated crossover.
Why are clear roles important when a husband and wife run a business together?
Chris and Helen found the business became easier to run when they stopped interfering as much in each other's areas and recognised that they brought different strengths, working styles and perspectives to the company.
Is running a business with your partner right for everyone?
No. Chris and Helen discuss other examples where couples or friends found working together difficult, and they say they would change the working arrangement if it began to damage their relationship.
How did Chris and Helen start their business?
They explain that they began without an existing customer base and initially used a low-cost printer. They use that experience to make the point that starting a business does not always require a large amount of money at the outset.