How to Find Your Puzzle Piece Partner or Co-founder - Issue #287 Invincible Career - Claim your power and regain your freedom

Would Apple be a $2 trillion company if Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs had been more alike? I highly doubt it.
Thanks to my time working at Apple many years ago, I had the opportunity to experience the personalities of both Steves. I can tell you that they were very, very different people.
"The day we started Apple he changed. He changed his personality forever because he now was a founder of a company that had money. He wanted so strongly to find the way to be an important person in the world. He became very serious. He would always speak as though he was the one on top of running Apple. That was good with me. I was the shy engineer who wanted to go into the laboratory and keep inventing things and building them. I didn't want to run a company with politics and people pushing each other out." — Steve Wozniak (source)
Jobs did seem larger than life. His famous “reality distortion field” was legit. You believed the grand vision he described. But, he was not someone you felt comfortable around, and he could be a terrifying leader (e.g., “Justify your existence!”).
On the other hand, Wozniak was a friendly guy who loved to joke around. He enjoyed telling us stories of the pranks he used to play. He loved building stuff and wanted to be left alone. He seemed happy to fade out of the spotlight and focus on his passion for education, gaming, and building new tech.
As strained as their friendship became later when Jobs started acting like a serious businessperson with a God complex, the complementary balance of strengths and differences between the two founders was necessary for Apple to succeed.
Jobs needed Wozniak’s quiet and focused creativity and engineering talent. Wozniak needed Jobs to boldly lead the company and market the hell out of their products.
At some point in your life, you too will seek to partner with one or more other people. You’ve probably already done it. That’s what it means to be an employee in a company. You don’t get hired to sit alone in a basement for years. You have to partner with your coworkers, manager, and other colleagues to get stuff done.
Sure, working solo has many benefits. I love it and have done it for years. But, I also know that I am limiting what I can accomplish by trying to go it alone.
“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” — African proverb
Partnering helps you achieve greater things. You’ll need to connect the unique “puzzle piece” of who you are with other complementary pieces to complete the full picture. That connection could be between:
* You and an employer when you’re trying to find the ideal role that will take your career to all new heights.
* You and a partner if you’re pursuing an entrepreneurial path and want to launch your first business.
* You and a life partner when you’re ready to commit and build a life together.
I’m not going to get into how to find your life partner in this newsletter article. I actually did write quite a bit about that earlier this year. If you’re interested, you can read my Lessons from 30 Years of Marriage (Parts 1-3).
So, how do you find the right co-founder when you’re ready to start your own business?
How do you find great professional partners when you’re seeking your next career move?
Getting this right is important because co-founder conflict is one of the top reasons that early startups fail. Bad bosses and toxic coworkers (i.e., your “partners” as an employee) are two of the top reasons people quit their jobs.
Why bother partnering?
No single person is a complete picture. We're all puzzle pieces. We have holes in some areas (i.e., our weaknesses) and tabs in others (i.e., our strengths).
I’ve consulted with startups where the founders were too much alike. They had the same talents, skills, experience, and personalities. Both founders were engineers. They were both interested in being the CEO. Neither one of them knew anything about design, customer