Wow, was last night interesting! Paul and I got invited to dinner to meet with the guy Paul was trying to partner with. Let’s call him Bob (not his real name). Before we can leave the apartment Paul gets a phone call that turns into a conference call. He hands me his keys to drive while he’s on the phone. We arrive at the restaurant first. Bob, his fiance and another friend arrive. We get seated, drinks, order food, Paul’s still outside on the phone. Bob was upset that Paul hadn’t come in yet. Bob is also upset about a project he and Paul had been working on that reached a bad place with the client. I go outside to get Paul’s dinner order because the kitchen is starting to shut down. Finally Paul comes to eat and, the tension is high.

Bob finally gets to what’s on his mind about his client of the day. That problem leads to the real problem, Bob hasn’t treated Paul and I as he should have in business by thinking only of himself and his “family.” Paul gets up from the table and walks out abruptly saying whatever attempts at developing a business for the future were dead.

Bob gets out to the parking lot before we leave and the heated conversation continues. It continued for at least another hour there. We all explained our reasonings and positions. Bob, was stunned but, he brought much of this upon himself. When Paul had brought Bob business and got paid, I said, why should Paul have to ask you to get paid for putting money in your pocket and, you say he’s a friend & family? Neglect is bad, very bad.

There were other issues by which Bob and Paul could not agree upon and probably never will. At the end of the night I told Bob he needs to think about what was being said (because I think that instead of hearing us he was thinking of what next to say). [Bob also needs to marry his girlfriend and give her the life she deserves. She's really sweet and very patient. :-)]

We drove home in silence.