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In this episode, Kate Northrup(@katenorthrup) & Mike Watts (@mikejwatts) talk about the important subject of how couples can work together to build a dream life and business. We touch on the importance of learning how and when to give up control, when to ask for help, and the need for each partner to find their own “Zone of Greatness.” Show notes and links for this episode can be found at www.katenorthrup.com/podcast.
In this episode, Kate Northrup(@katenorthrup) & Mike Watts (@mikejwatts) talk about the important subject of how couples can work together to build a dream life and business. We touch on the importance of learning how and when to give up control, when to ask for help, and the need for each partner to find their own “Zone of Greatness.”
Show notes and links for this episode can be found at www.katenorthrup.com/podcast.
What if you could get more of what you want in life? But not through pushing, forcing, or pressure.
You can.
When it comes to money, time, and energy, no one’s gonna turn away more.
And Kate Northrup, Bestselling Author of Money: A Love Story and Do Less and host of Plenty, is here to help you expand your capacity to receive all of the best.
As a Money Empowerment OG who’s been at it for nearly 2 decades, Kate’s the abundance-oriented best friend you may not even know you’ve always needed.
Pull up a chair every week with top thought leaders, luminaries, and adventurers to learn how to have more abundance with ease.
Hi. I'm Kate Northrup.
Mike Watts:And I'm Mike Watts. And we're partners in life, love, and business.
Kate Northrup:Welcome to the Kate and Mike show, where we share insights and interviews on entrepreneurship, relationships, parenting, self actualization, and making a life not just a living. Welcome to the Kate and Mike show. I'm Kate.
Mike Watts:And I'm Mike.
Kate Northrup:And we are talking about life, love, and business. We are partners in life, love, and business, and we're talking about it. So last episode we shared with you the story of how we met and this crazy road trip we took for ten months and 41 states and 34,000 miles. And we only have Alaska left. And today we are talking about business partnerships, contracts, how to get into a business partnership with your eyes wide open, especially when there is a personal relationship involved.
Kate Northrup:So we're just going to tell our story and what we learned along the way.
Mike Watts:Right. And we started working together as a partnership as boyfriend girlfriend style before when we were boyfriend and girlfriend. Before we were engaged or husband and wife. But I think, like, what we're gonna talk about today is also learnings from if you're gonna do a business partnership or, really, you could apply some of the principles to any partnership in life or business based off what we're talking about today. Because I think it's really important where we just jump into things and we're like, oh, that wasn't a very smart idea.
Mike Watts:Or you see these individuals now on Shark Tank that are teaming up with the sharks on Shark Tank, but they're also turning over a large portion of their organization and a large portion of their company. And what things like that actually mean. And we'll probably interview experts more from venture capitalist perspective in the future. Because I think I don't have the knowledge around that and neither does Kate. So it'd be good to get some real experts on here that talk about when there's buyouts or you're raising money or stuff like that.
Mike Watts:And I'm very curious to learn more about that.
Kate Northrup:But that's not what we're talking about
Mike Watts:today. No, it's not.
Kate Northrup:Today, we are talking about how we ended up in business together. So in addition to Mike telling me the night that he called me before we left on our road trip, he was supposed to be with me for five days and it turned into a lifetime really, but that turned into ten months. He had called me that night and said, okay, so I think we should go on this road trip. We should spend a year traveling the country and then we should come back and get married. And I was like, okay, I gotta go.
Kate Northrup:I was totally overwhelmed by that. Then within the first couple of weeks of our road trip, I think Mike suggested that we go into business together. And I was completely freaked out by that idea. That felt like way too much too soon, so I completely shot it down. And then you mentioned it again.
Kate Northrup:I remember when we were living in the Hamptons, I remember actually exactly where we were sitting on the couch when you mentioned it again, and still, I was like, that's a terrible idea. It really scared me.
Mike Watts:I said I should be your manager.
Kate Northrup:You said you should be my manager because I remember I had been negotiating this speaking gig. These people wanted me to come to Vegas and do a speaking gig, and I was going back and forth with them over email and talking to them on the phone. And after I got off the phone, Mike was like, you shouldn't be having those conversations. Like, I should be having those for you. I should be your business manager.
Kate Northrup:And I panicked. I just was like, oh, that sounds scary. But then about maybe a year and a half after that, I don't exactly remember, but it became clear that it made way more sense for us to be in business together than for us to be trying to build two things separately. And I think in general, when you think about the resources you have or the resources we have, it didn't make sense to be building two personal brands or two online brands, two USANA businesses. It just made no sense logistically speaking, But my background was that I had gone into business with my mom.
Kate Northrup:We had partnered up with a USANA business and USANA is the direct selling company that we partner with. And she and I had built that business together. I think we were partnered for maybe two and a half, three years, and we just sort of jumped into it. We never sat down and made an agreement. We never put anything in writing.
Kate Northrup:We never really spelled it out. So towards the end of it, as things were beginning to become uncomfortable, I felt really unclear and I was undervaluing myself and I was undervalued in the relationship and it was very, very murky. So I had this experience of having gone into business with somebody who I love very, very much, my mom. Not that it turned out badly, I mean, my mom and I are closer than ever, but it was uncomfortable there at the end. And I sort of had made a vow to myself, I won't go into a business partnership again, certainly without some sort of written agreement.
Kate Northrup:And I didn't wanna just jump into it because it felt scary to me based on a past experience. So do you wanna talk a little bit about how we handled that and what we put into Handled
Mike Watts:the relationship with your mom?
Kate Northrup:Oh, no. We don't need to talk about That's handled in my book, Money, A Love Story. If you want to get that, it's in written form and in audio form. Can get it at audible.comi or amazon.
Mike Watts:Think it was good learning for Kate, which she can explain this more to you about some takeaways from having a partnership previously. Then what was your thought process when we started working together? When I mentioned it like three or four times that we should work together, what was uncomfortable about that?
Kate Northrup:I felt like we were new into our relationship. And even though
Mike Watts:Which we were.
Kate Northrup:If I had really checked in with myself, I knew I wanted to marry you, but it was so new and it was so unexpected. Like, I went on this road trip expecting to spend a year by myself. And then literally from day one, you were with me. And I just was so thrown off that it wasn't happening the way I expected it to, that it just felt scary to go all in because I was afraid of what would happen if it didn't work out. And then I also just to be perfectly honest, I had fear around giving up control of some of what I had created.
Kate Northrup:And now granted what I had created up to that point, it's not exactly like it was an empire, but it was definitely a budding empire. I mean, I had a solid email list. I had solid open rates. I had a solid USANA business. I just felt like I've created all this stuff.
Kate Northrup:I can be a little bit like an emperor.
Mike Watts:An emperor?
Kate Northrup:Yeah. In the tarot deck, there's this emperor card. You always have positives and negatives around everything. For example, like if I'm eating a cookie and somebody asks me for a piece of it, and I've been like this since I was a little girl, I will often just like my mom would ask me for a piece of my cookie growing up, and I would literally, like, break off a crumb. So I would say that one of my learning areas is I'm great
Mike Watts:at Don't ever ask Kate for her cookie.
Kate Northrup:I have trouble sharing dessert. I'm just gonna put it out.
Mike Watts:Yeah. I did.
Kate Northrup:So do you.
Mike Watts:Oh, Big time. I will share anything besides dessert.
Kate Northrup:I've gotten better at it, though. Or The more I savor each bite and the more I slow down, the less I need. So if we're sharing dessert and I really take the first bite and actually taste it and breathe and put down the spoon or the fork, it's amazing. I probably only need two or three bites and then I feel very satisfied. That's a little mindful eating lesson for you.
Kate Northrup:Try it out next time you eat dessert. Then also notice who you're with when you're really rushing eating and what are the emotions that you're feeling. If you tap into those things, you can really slow that whole process down and eat less. But why am I talking about this? Oh yeah, because sharing.
Kate Northrup:I can be a little bit of an emperor. And so I really was a little bit like, I created this, this is mine. And there was a part of me that was afraid that you would wanna take it or something. I mean, it makes no sense when I actually say it out loud, but that's what's so powerful about articulating our fears. I don't think I have ever articulated out loud before what I was scared of.
Kate Northrup:And when I say it out loud, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense because
Mike Watts:Well, does make sense though. So don't discredit that because and I've never heard this either. That's why I asked the question. Because think about it like when we drop Penelope off the first day at camp, a k a daycare. We call it camp.
Mike Watts:Right? It's like you grew this little human and then you birth this little human and then you're gonna trust where we think we know what we're doing is the best thing that we know what we're doing. At least try that we're doing the best job. And then we just turn it over to somebody else to give them to be like, okay.
Kate Northrup:Well true. It's a control issue. It is control. Really is control issue. And I am a complete recovering control freak.
Kate Northrup:And I did not realize the degree of this until I had a child, and that's a whole other episode. But it was really scary for me to give up any control over my tiny empire. But what I've learned, and I think that this is a great lesson in general, is that when we are willing to give up control over some aspect of our life, we can create so much more and have a much bigger impact. So for example, with Penelope going to camp every day, she doesn't go every day, three days a week for a full day. I am so much more calm and allowing the women who work at the daycare center to help us.
Kate Northrup:It's like, oh my gosh, the ability to have an impact in the world has expanded a lot because I'm so much calmer. There's three days a week that I know I'm gonna have a break and that I know I can focus on business. And it's really powerful. And what I found in our business together is that when I was willing to give up control, and you started running a lot of the logistics and a lot of the operations and a lot of the technological stuff that like I'm okay at. But I would say if you've ever read the book, The Big Leap, there's your zone of incompetence, your zone of competence, your zone of excellence, and your zone of genius.
Kate Northrup:Nobody really spends a whole lot of time in their zone of incompetence. If you're incompetent at something, you usually get help. But we spend a
Mike Watts:lot of- Or you just avoid it.
Kate Northrup:Or you just avoid it. But if it has to be done, you get help. But we spend a lot of our time in our zone of competence and especially the sneaky one is our zone of excellence. So the zone of competence is things that you can do. You know, you're not the best at them, but you can get the job done.
Kate Northrup:So I would say working in the backend of WordPress with code is a zone of competence for me. Like I can get the job done so it looks okay. But I would not say I'm excellent at that by any means. And it's definitely not my zone of genius. Your zone of genius are things where you are doing them and you lose track of time and you're totally energized by it.
Kate Northrup:And the results are generally really great because you're totally in your flow. It's the concept by that book, Michal Csikszentmihalyi called Flow. So anyway, I was doing a lot of the things in my zone of competence and my zone of excellence. And really my zone of genius is more the content creation writing and the teaching aspects. And so bringing Mike into the company allowed me to do more of my zone of genius and allowed him to really shine with his zone of genius as well.
Kate Northrup:And I mean, it was amazing, like within a couple of months of us going into partnership, we went to one of our USANA events and everybody was like, it's amazing to see how your brand is flourishing and thriving and shining. And everybody was coming up to Mike and saying like, we know it's because you've come into Kate's life. So it was really powerful to have that outside reflection. So it's not to say like, always be willing to give up control, but for the right people, well, yes, I mean, you always wanna be part of steering the ship, but being willing to give up control of the day to day and the little minutia stuff and like the things that you're not that good at, or that you're okay at, but don't energize you. Those are the things that you wanna get rid of, get off your plate as soon as possible.
Kate Northrup:And whether that's outsourcing, is another episode, or going into some sort of partnership is really a powerful move. What were you thinking when you brought up that we should go into business together?
Mike Watts:I don't know. I have no idea.
Kate Northrup:You don't remember?
Mike Watts:No. It was like a gut feeling. Mhmm. It's like this is what we should do because it makes the most sense. And it goes back to like what is my strong point in business.
Mike Watts:Right? So from the aspect of what am I really good at, right? And I'm good at supporting people in their endeavors. My whole career has been that, whether it's at Philip Morris or whether it was my internships, being a manager of employees, That's what you're doing. You're supporting people to produce products.
Mike Watts:And that's what I did at Philip Morris. And I don't know, just felt like that was the right thing to do. No, it's four years ago, five years ago now, where in 2011, 2012, we are also new and it was a different place. And I also was running out of money. So when I thought about it, it was where can we have the biggest impact?
Mike Watts:I knew of us traveling together and I knew us being together and we were going along the road at a really good pace and our relationship was developing into something that seemed like it was gonna be greater than just boyfriend girlfriend. I just felt that this was probably a direction to go. Because I also now thinking back now, it's like you were struggling at certain points, and didn't have the strength in certain areas. And that where I did,
Kate Northrup:like, with discipline around project management and productivity and logistics. Everything was much more spontaneous. It was just like, oh, I'm gonna do this promotion like today, right now. And now we have a whole other system going in. If we can break down how we run our business another day.
Kate Northrup:So many episode ideas, Mike's writing them all down. But I also want to say, I'll tell you another thing that made me uncomfortable. I had this idea that despite being raised by a feminist and like knowing that I could do anything, I really had this idea. And it's still even embarrassing to say this, that I wanted to meet a guy who was financially well off, who on some level would take care of me. And so the idea where it would be switched that in some way that you would come into my business, I had always just imagined it would be not necessarily the opposite that I would join someone else's business, but that my man would come along and sort of sweep me off my feet and then me just I'm being honest here that, like, maybe I just wouldn't even have to deal with the money anymore.
Kate Northrup:And I knew better than that. And if that had happened to me, I never would have proven to myself what I'm made of, like creating my own business, separating from my mom's company and brand, being able to pay off all my debt, being able to create my own income, being able to build a 6 figure business. I mean, all of those things, if you end up, you know, quote unquote, being saved from yourself when it comes to money by somebody else, whether it's somebody who sweeps in and takes care of you financially or whatever, if I had been sort of bailed out by somebody, I never would have developed the self worth, the self value, the confidence that I have today that if we lost everything, I have no doubt we could just create it again. And that's because we actually did that as opposed to, you know, meeting a guy who could come and just be like, oh, you know, just don't worry about it. You can go write your little blog and you know, don't worry about it.
Kate Northrup:So what I realized though, and this was so powerful, is that what I really wanted was to feel taken care of. And I thought that the package that needed to come in was a guy who would be totally abundant and could come and just take care of me financially. But when I really dipped below that desire, what I realized is I wanted to feel taken care of. And when I looked at the relationship with Mike at that time, and that was like in the first year or two of our relationship, I really was taken care of like the way that you planned the road trip, the way that you made sure I got from place to place the way you made sure we had food and that the logistics were organized and that we had a place to sleep and that we knew how to get from place to place and just emotionally that I was okay. You really took care of me right from the beginning.
Kate Northrup:And I took care of you in many ways as well. So I'm not saying this is a one way street, but when I looked at it, I realized I am being taken care of, and this is an opportunity for both of us to grow. And I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that we have grown this business together to create so much more abundance than certainly I could have by myself and perhaps then you could have by yourself. I don't know, but it was a great retooling of my mindset to realize I have what I always wanted, which is a life of financial freedom. And we got to create that abundance together in partnership as opposed to somebody swooping in and handing it to me, which never would have taught me the lessons that I needed to learn.
Kate Northrup:So it was a really big mental shift that I had to make where I realized I actually am getting what I want. I feel the way I want to feel. And I just need to switch my mind around letting go of the window dressing of what I thought it would look like. And that's where I wrote the post that we turned into the poster. It's not going to turn out the way you thought it would.
Kate Northrup:It will be better, which is available at katenorthrup.com. But it's my most popular blog post. And it's really I wrote that because it was about the road trip and it was about my relationship with Mike.
Mike Watts:It's really good. Forward /shop.
Kate Northrup:Katenorthrup.com forward /shop.
Mike Watts:Yeah. Think it's really profound to have those realizations. And I was just thinking as you were talking about this is how many times do we take for granted the other person, and we're not acknowledging what they actually bring to the table. Right? And so we focus more on what they lack versus what they're actually bringing to the relationship.
Mike Watts:And that was a big discussion we had along the road and some of the biggest lessons that I mean, what Kate just shared with you is it was, like, also elegant and beautiful, but it took, like, I don't know, five months for her to really come to that.
Kate Northrup:And a full body rash.
Mike Watts:Yeah. Twice. And It was messy. Yeah. It was really messy.
Mike Watts:But it took a little bit of time and it was hard. And it was hard. I mean we just met and then we're in a car together for eleven months. And then a completely life changing. Right?
Mike Watts:We both ended up leaving and moving our houses. Kate ended a partnership with her mom. We started kind of working together, but not officially or in some sort of organized format. Then And we were traveling all over the country. We're staying with a lot of her friends, some of my friends, but mostly her friends, and just really living life and enjoying it.
Mike Watts:When I think back to that time, it was enjoyable. And I do remember a lot of it. So it's not something that just was a blink in our life that I missed. You know, I was really there for that, which I'm really grateful for that aspect. But it is allowing other people to help you in life and in business is one of the reasons that businesses fail.
Kate Northrup:Because not allowing people to help
Mike Watts:not allowing people to help you. Yes. So just allowing someone's expertise to come in or asking for help like it's not even just allowing people, but I know in our relationship as a couple being married, we have to ask each other for help. And if Kate needs help on something like to watch the baby or I wanna go do this, instead of just putting the baby down and not asking me and then getting mad at me because I wanna watch the baby, I don't know that she needs help with watching the baby unless someone asks. So when it came to working together on the road trip, really acknowledging each other's strengths and skills, which I don't know, think I had more.
Mike Watts:I mean, my background with business and work is a little bit different than Kate's. And I think that it's a benefit as well because she's been able to, you know, run her own show since she was 18 years old. And I had worked in corporate America for a while. It's a different structure. So you understand in an environment like that, you're not able to get everything done yourself where you're built to ask for help along the way.
Mike Watts:You know, what we were doing is also different than working in corporate America by starting a business together and going down that path and really working together and acknowledging where our limiting beliefs are or what we're lacking. Like, she talked about just letting go of control aspect, which we all love to control. And I completely understand. Like, you created it. It was your blog.
Mike Watts:It was your website that you built. You did it on your own. And just like many people do that all the time, right, with a lot of things that we
Kate Northrup:But it's sort of like, let's say we were builders and I had laid
Mike Watts:A house? Like a building a house?
Kate Northrup:Mhmm. I had laid the foundation of a house. Right. That's what existed
Mike Watts:when you Specialty.
Kate Northrup:When you came And then you came in and built the house and put all the finishes and whatever. And maybe I picked the fixtures, but, like, essentially
Mike Watts:You would definitely pick the fixtures.
Kate Northrup:The lighting and definitely the window treatments and the rugs and everything. But I'm more of the design team. But it really was like that foundation, but I couldn't live in it. I couldn't live in just the foundation of a house. It needed a lot on top of it, and I wouldn't have been able to build it as solid Yep.
Kate Northrup:And certainly as effective.
Mike Watts:Well, it's really true. Like, you know, we're just staying on this concept. Like, the person that lays the concrete like the foundation, the basement, most likely isn't the person that's framing the house. Right. So those are two different specialties.
Kate Northrup:You really need both.
Mike Watts:Skill sets. Yes. And you definitely need both. So it's one of that aspect when you're bringing it to your business or even like your life, like our life, We have different aspects and different skill sets, what we're good at. And then we hire out or get help on things that we don't like.
Mike Watts:For instance, like cleaning the house. I don't want to clean the house. Want Kate doesn't want to clean the house, stuff like that. So I think that's really to recognize that as you are building your business or building foundation for your family.
Kate Northrup:Doctor. Absolutely. So then when we decided we would go into business together, what was really powerful is we made this decision before we had gotten engaged and before we got married. And I you know, I think both of us pretty much knew we were headed that direction. Otherwise, we wouldn't have gone into business.
Mike Watts:We were engaged when we signed the documents.
Kate Northrup:Okay. Oh, were we?
Mike Watts:By two months.
Kate Northrup:Okay. You're right.
Mike Watts:We were We decided to work together beforehand.
Kate Northrup:But we hadn't signed the documents yet.
Mike Watts:We ended up getting engaged July Then you decided to
Kate Northrup:put a ring on it to make it official.
Mike Watts:Oh, Beyonce reference. Ding.
Kate Northrup:But anyway, so what we did is we met with my aunt and uncle, Penny and Phil. And our daughter Penelope is named after my aunt Penny. So we met with them because they have been married for over forty years, and they've got kids and they're business partners. And they've been mentors for us spiritually, business wise, relationship wise, health wise. I mean, they're just amazing people.
Kate Northrup:So we decided to talk to them about how we could set it up. We took them out to dinner, and they really gave us some great insight about just things to look out for.
Mike Watts:They also gave you clarity that you wanted to move. Why? Do you remember this conversation? No. Because we talked about structures of how people run their life.
Mike Watts:Right? Yeah. Some couples share finances. Because we were at the point where we had to combine finances. Were just like, okay.
Mike Watts:So we're living together, but we were kind of combining finances, but we weren't. This was early awkward. Middle twenty thirteen. And we were paying for things, and then I was basically a freelancer for Kate Northrup Inc, which was Kate's company. And as she would make money, as we would funnel it through there, we basically paid me out as a percentage.
Mike Watts:So she was writing me a check, and then we were paying bills together or you're taking yeah. It was all it was but it was worked for us. Like, was complicated when we think about it now. It worked until it didn't worked for a little bit. Until it was like, okay.
Mike Watts:I mean, truthfully, I think a lot of it were it took, like, a three year period for you to come to grips to be like, we're actually moving forward with life together
Kate Northrup:Yeah.
Mike Watts:Or something. I don't know.
Kate Northrup:Well, in a lot of people, we talk about, like, what's the difference between resistance showing up and fear versus our intuition.
Mike Watts:Right.
Kate Northrup:And you might have thought, like, well, somebody might look at this story and be like, okay. You're feeling anxious about this. You have a full body rash. You're freaked out. Whatever.
Kate Northrup:Maybe it's not the right thing to do. But I find that my intuition, when my inner guidance is speaking to me, my inner guidance speaks to me more abruptly and more in a flash. Like when I got the flash to invite Mike, it was like, invite Mike on this road trip. And it was just like, what? Who said that?
Kate Northrup:Versus when I have fear or anxiety around something, that's usually my resistance. And it's more chronic. I'll have repetitive thoughts. I'll have whatever physical symptom comes up. So that to me was resistance to my growth and my greatness.
Kate Northrup:And it's fine. It took three years, and that's it is what it is. Yep. Right? So it's not like this stuff happens overnight.
Kate Northrup:Same thing with my finances. I knew for years I needed to clean up my act there. I think it was probably four years from the time I first realized it to the time I actually got it together. So just know like your timing is
Mike Watts:Yeah. Which usually happens for a lot of people. Know, it's not something where we do life changing things overnight where we might have to take Little
Kate Northrup:bits by
Mike Watts:little bits. Yeah, takes a little step. So it took a while for you know for Kate was like okay we need to do something different then we went and met with Penny and Phil. They gave us the layout of how people handle their finances so that they've seen couple wise. Right?
Mike Watts:You can either go all in from the beginning where you're combining your finances. You can have separate incomes where couples will say, I make the money here. You know, the husband or wife for the two people, they each make their own money and then they come together to combined expenses. Know, it's like, rents this or mortgages this and then they add money to that and they split it. Or there's other avenues where, you know, one person makes all the money and then they pay it from that perspective.
Mike Watts:And then the other person gets like an allowance or something you know to use money for themselves like that's a different arrangement right and then there's another one where they share income but then they each get like allowance each month so they can go spend money on whatever they want. So there's a lot of different structures of how couples can run their life together. And so Penny and Phil just explained a lot of that to us. And Penny and Phil just basically asked us was like, where do you guys see yourself going in the future? Do you see this moving beyond we were not engaged in this conversation beyond just like boyfriend girlfriend kind of hanging out?
Mike Watts:Like do you see this developing to something more long term? And I think at that moment was Kate's realization was like, do. And it was the first time I heard her say, like, I do see this moving forward. And they were like, great. So what we did from the beginning is we just combined our finances from the beginning.
Mike Watts:This is what Penny and Phil did. So for us, that felt the most comfortable. So we were
Kate Northrup:actually the easiest. And I have to say, I had just big hang ups about finances in our relationship up until then. But from that moment on, I have felt so much more relaxed just knowing that we're in this together. This is not you versus me versus who's making more versus whatever. It's felt really spacious and really relaxing and much more like we're on the same team.
Kate Northrup:So that really works for us.
Mike Watts:Yeah, right. I believe so. It does. We're all in I thought you were gonna go someplace else
Kate Northrup:with Oh, sorry. Threw me out. The yeah.
Mike Watts:It's a 100%. Like, for us, it works. I know I think my sister and her husband don't combine everything like we do because I remember we had a conversation about that and it works for them.
Kate Northrup:Yep.
Mike Watts:And then my parents do something different. You know? So it's one of those aspects where you really have to go with what feels
Kate Northrup:I think whatever you do, though, definitely have clear conversations around it. I will tell you what won't work, and that's doing it by default and not Right. Having a clear agreement and not having a clear system.
Mike Watts:Right.
Kate Northrup:So whatever you do, make sure it's clear. Make sure you've talked about it. Make sure it aligns with your values and your lifestyle. Default generally will fall apart at some point. My business relationship with my mom, we did it by default, we never talked about it with any clarity, and it did eventually fall apart.
Kate Northrup:So when we decided to go into business together, we combine our finances first, and then we actually met with a lawyer to write up an agreement, which made me feel so much better about my fear of like, oh my gosh, what's gonna happen? What if I don't get to have what I've created anymore? And we wrote into the agreement that basically, if anything were to happen with our relationship, what would be the assets that were mine ahead of time? So it was basically like a prenup. I mean, honestly, was like a business prenup.
Kate Northrup:So it said, you know, the assets of my book and whatever else and like a certain amount in our USANA business, if anything were to happen, that would be mine. And then anything we've created together since then, as business assets would be split fiftyfifty. And that felt really, really good. And we sat in a lawyer's office and we made an official document and we wrote it up. And that was really, really fantastic.
Kate Northrup:If you are going to get married and either one of you or both of you has assets coming into the marriage, I really recommend Eprin up. I do. And it's like when you go on a picnic, if you don't bring the napkins, you'll inevitably spill the grape juice all over you. But if you have the napkins, chances are good. There aren't any big spills.
Kate Northrup:It's like insurance and people listening to this people get so up in arms about the idea of a prenup, but the thing is it protects you. I have found in our relationship, the fact that I know we have a plan if something were to happen makes me feel safe. I don't know. It just does. It just makes me feel like I valued myself.
Kate Northrup:Like Mike values what we both created. And it's not to say that I don't intend to be with you for the rest of my life, which I absolutely do, but it's just to be safe. And, you know, I do come from a background of a divorced family, so there might be an element of that in it. But If you wanna know more about this, I really recommend my friend Janice's book, Let's Talk About Money, A Girlfriend's Guide to Protecting Your Assets by Janice Goldman Pickler.
Mike Watts:No. I agree with Kate. You know, we're not gonna give relationship advice because every relationship needs to be discussed individually with themselves. You know, we can share our experience and you can learn little things from here and there. But overall, like, we're not relationship experts.
Mike Watts:Nobody really is. Regarding a prenup, it never crossed my mind for the most part. But from a business contract standpoint, that made sense, which, as Kate said, is basically what we signed was pretty much like a prenup. And it just created a conversation with the two of us to know where each one of us stood. And we had a serious conversation about it.
Mike Watts:It brought some stuff up. My parents are still married, so I haven't experienced divorce at the home front. It's not something that I understood at that moment, like what Kate went through with her parents being divorced. But the bottom line is we had a really real conversation between the two of us about our life and our business together. And knowing that we have things in place, it just feels better to both of us.
Mike Watts:It's clear.
Kate Northrup:And money loves Clarity. Clarity. Money loves clarity. Money loves
Mike Watts:Let's all say it together. Money loves clarity.
Kate Northrup:And money also is attracted to a safe container where it knows it's valued and taken care of. And so having that agreement has felt like a really safe container for us to create abundance because money is money is valued and taken care of. And so I just wanted to say the book is let's talk about money, the girlfriend's guide to protecting her assets, and it's by Janice Goldman. Just Goldman.
Mike Watts:Which will be in the show notes.
Kate Northrup:In the show notes. But that Which
Mike Watts:you can find at Kate Northrup dot com forward slash podcast, and there's a search box if it's not one of the first two
Kate Northrup:that And look for, yeah, look for today's episode.
Mike Watts:Right.
Kate Northrup:So that's what we did. We signed a business contract and then and we were already in the midst of planning our wedding at that time as well. So we knew we were headed this direction.
Mike Watts:Right. Because we were engaged 07/04/2013. This contract we signed was August 13, I believe, of 2013. And then we were married in July 2014. So we knew we were moving forward from a direction.
Mike Watts:I think the lawyer said he's actually never had two people come in that were business owners and engaged sign a business contract. So we were, like, the first one.
Kate Northrup:Well, you know, when we do things that are sort of rites of passage or ceremonial or like signing a contract, things to me, I feel that they're all in the same category, whether it's getting married, having a baby, starting a business signing a contract, there are moments in time that mark before that moment, there was something else going on. And after that moment, there's a whole new energy. And I really felt that like from the day we signed that contract, I felt like we are officially on the same team and it's in writing. And we know that we can go full out because we know we're protected. Like we have this safety net, basically.
Kate Northrup:That's how I felt. I felt like I could expand as wide and as we could together, because there was this net to fall back on. And so that's what it did for us. And it's been amazing ever since then really being in business together. I mean, of course, we have our days, but overall, I can't imagine not running a business with my husband.
Kate Northrup:I never really envisioned that in my life before. So it's kinda cool. Our friend Brianna was here checking out our office spaces, and she saw my office, and she was like, oh, it's so far away from Mike's. Like, you guys don't work in the same room. I was like, hell no.
Kate Northrup:We don't work at the same room. We've tried that, and we drive each other crazy. And we even figured out on our phones the other day on our landline how to use the intercom so we could, like
Mike Watts:Intercom each other.
Kate Northrup:Intercom each other. We haven't really done that much.
Mike Watts:But No. I don't think we will.
Kate Northrup:No. But because when you get in the flow and this is a whole other topic about distraction and how to keep yourself focused. But when you get in the flow of work and somebody comes and asks you a question or distracts you, they find that we get distracted about every eleven minutes and that it takes us twenty five minutes to get refocused on that task. So if you imagine, and you can take this right to work, track it. How many times are you distracted by a Facebook message, by somebody walking in and needing something, by, you know, whatever it is, your emails, whatever.
Kate Northrup:So we try to minimize that as
Mike Watts:much as possible. And that's what works for us because we're both extroverts. I can imagine our friends James and Chelsea who are both introverts, they could probably work next to each other for hours and never say one word to each other. You know? I totally know James could.
Mike Watts:You know? Probably. He James could sit in a room of five people and never talk to anybody, but, you know, bust out the million dollar sales page.
Kate Northrup:It's like impossible for me to be in a room with somebody and
Mike Watts:not talk to Yeah. It's just so interesting. But, yeah, the contract, when we ended up signing it, I mean, it didn't really change anything for me. I also didn't go through a partnership that she had with her and her mother. You know, like, I didn't experience that as well.
Kate Northrup:I was coming into this with a little more baggage.
Mike Watts:Yeah. You had way more baggage. So for me, I just was like, okay. Well, whatever you wanna do, I'll do it. That was basically the attitude I took towards it.
Mike Watts:So if it makes you feel better, I was like, know we're gonna get married. I know we're gonna have kids. I know we're gonna run this business together. And I know we're gonna build this empire and blah blah blah blah. Like we're gonna go down this path.
Mike Watts:But if you need to sign a piece of paper, that's great. But I do agree. It created a conversation about what were the challenges you had in that relationship in the other business partnership? What were the struggles? What was something that you didn't feel good about?
Mike Watts:And we were able to work through those things when we signed that piece of paper and onwards from there. Know, it allows us to really create something else. You know, we're creating else something bigger than ourselves and that one of those entities is the business. Another entity of that is Penelope in our marriage. Right?
Mike Watts:Our family
Kate Northrup:Yeah.
Mike Watts:Or is bigger than just the two of us. So and I think that was a really positive thing that has come out of it.
Kate Northrup:It really was. So I think that's all we have to say about it today. But I really wanna remind you if you are going into business partnership with somebody, a, make sure you both know your strengths, know what your zones of genius are, know what you love to do, what you don't love to do, and then allocate the tasks accordingly. We were talking with a couple who works in business together the other day, and they realized they're both really good at writing content and they're both excellent writers and that's a big part of their business, but they don't have anybody working with them who's good at logistics and neither of them are. So we really recommended like, Hey, you're missing a major part of running a business, so you might want to outsource the logistics part because Right.
Kate Northrup:Trying to ask you both to fit into a role that you're not good at is no good.
Mike Watts:So It's not a good idea.
Kate Northrup:Make sure you know your strengths, your weaknesses. Don't spend too much time trying to build up your weaknesses. There's plenty of other people who are good at the things that you're weak at. So just do your strengths, do the stuff that feels good. And then I really recommend written agreements and clear, honest conversations leading into things because money loves clarity and you'll feel more safe and you'll feel more safe to expand when you have those conversations.
Kate Northrup:And you know, unanswered questions and conversations that need to happen that haven't happened, add a lot of static and friction that slow down your growth. So when you haven't had the conversation you need to have, when you haven't asked the question you need to ask, it's really energetically draining. So I recommend having those conversations and asking those questions as soon as possible. So you can really pick up speed and expand your growth.
Mike Watts:Totally. I would always like to know if you were in a partnership, you know, what's worked for you and your partner and what hasn't. If you're in a business partnership or even if it's just a personal relationship that you can share some strengths. Maybe you have a contract or a prenup or something you put together and, like, why was that put together? What was the philosophy behind it?
Mike Watts:I'm curious. I'm also curious about, like, how do you and your partner share money? Yeah. You know? I'm curious about that too.
Mike Watts:How many people go all in, or how many people are, you know, doing it a different way and what other ways that are out there?
Kate Northrup:And where should they let us know that? On the episode.com/podcast.
Mike Watts:Yep.
Kate Northrup:And then this episode and We'll be right there. You can let us know in the comments right there. And as always, please head over to iTunes if you're enjoying this podcast and let us know. Give us a five star rating if you love it. Those things are really important so that we can keep growing and expanding.
Mike Watts:And if we're only a three or four star to you, let us know that too, and we can improve.
Kate Northrup:Work on it. Yes. Have a great day. Cheers. Ever feel like you're constantly doing things but aren't able to carve out the time or energy for the things that really matter to you?
Kate Northrup:Mike and I wanna share our top five tools for making a life, not just a living. To learn what they are, go to katenorthrup.com/tools. See you on the next episode.