Reading about Karl Stefanovic’s very public business breakup with his podcast partner Keshnee Ibrahim, my immediate thought was that I’ve had mayonnaise in my fridge that’s had a longer shelf life.
The two are now battling it out in NSW Supreme Court with claims of an “irreconcilable breakdown of relationship”.
But it also made me reflect on my own very long business partnership with Ange Priestley–a decade this year– and thank the stars I landed her and not Karlos.
Ten years. Which in indie media years is roughly 147.
Whenever I’m asked what I think is the secret sauce behind Women’s Agenda’s success, I almost always say it’s a business partnership that works.
Sometimes I attribute this to good luck, (as so many women do), but in truth there’s a lot more to it.
Ange and I didn’t fall into a perfect formula, we built it. It’s taken years, and in many ways, we’re married. (Sorry Mark, Ange’s real husband).
When we decided to own a company together, we had thankfully already been working together for a few years and knew our respective strengths and weaknesses. There was a strong sense for why our dynamic might just go the distance, including shared values and ideas for Women’s Agenda’s place in the ether.
We have also always made decisions together. Most days, I will call Ange around 14 times. To discuss a story, laugh about an awkward client interaction, tick tack on a new strategy, or plan a business trip together. Sometimes, I need to unload about my personal life. Thankfully, she is very obliging—except when on deadline.
She is the person I trust more than anyone outside of family; and in truth, a business partnership without trust is one headed swiftly for the gurgler.
We know the state of each other’s changing finances, our work, our families and our lives. We know what the other person is worried about before they have necessarily said it out loud, and we know when the other one is having a day where the best thing we can do is probably not ask too many questions.
We have also seen each other through an extraordinary amount of life.
Ange has seen me through a miscarriage and two successful pregnancies. She has seen me exhausted, anxious, furious, completely overwhelmed and trying to run a media company while raising two small children through a separation and a seriously ill parent.
I’ve watched her do a variation of the same while raising three boys. Between us, we have five children under 13, which means there have been approximately 7,000 conversations over the years that have begun with some manner of, “sorry, I’ve just got to deal with the kids.”
Just this morning, I was late to publishing after forgetting my son’s lunchbox at drop off.
We’ve supported each other through all major milestones in life and at work and never made the other feel guilty for things outside of our control.
And through it all, we built Women’s Agenda into the shared vision we’ve had since 2016.
We’ve navigated a pandemic, political upheaval, major news events, changing social platforms, changing business models, changing audiences and a media landscape that has repeatedly experienced an extended nervous breakdown.
We’ve had good years, bad years, big wins and moments where we’ve looked at each other and wondered whether we can realistically keep going. Just us, and an incredible team, bootstrapped to the hilt.
We always return to ‘yeah, we can’.
And through all of it, the partnership has remained.
There is something pretty remarkable about finding a person with whom you can share that much, and still want to sit next to them (virtually obvs) on a Monday morning and work out what you’re going to do next.
So, Karl, if you’re looking for your next business partner, I’d suggest finding someone who can tell you when you’re wrong, someone who will pick up the slack when life gets hairy and, most importantly, someone you can still imagine wanting to work with when you’ve both aged considerably and the business has changed beyond recognition.
And perhaps get the shareholders’ agreement sorted early.
Because if Ange and I can make it to 10 years without ending up in the Supreme Court, I’m starting to think we might actually know what we’re doing.