Entrepreneurs often develop strong feelings about the connection of friendship to business success\u2014feelings that can get in the way when they enter a corporate setting.<\/p>\n
Consider an entrepreneur\u2014let\u2019s call him Mike\u2014who sold his company to a big corporation and agreed to stay on as the head of the small division created from his startup. He had brought his head of marketing with him and considered him a fast friend. After all, the two of them had spent several years in the trenches together building the startup into a vibrant enterprise and three years doing the same thing in their rapidly growing new division. But when a corporate reorganization came along and the marketing head was moved to corporate, Mike mistakenly regarded the challenges that ensued as a test of their friendship rather than as a test of his leadership. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n