Ask HN: Texts to share with my co-founder re time-management and teamwork?

The business is physical business with production facilities, that exists for 6-7 years. During this time it hasn't grown but has always supported its owner financially. I've always helped a little bit with communication and marketing but not too much because there was lack of execution on the other side. Last year we agreed that together we can make this thing grow and I joined as partner.

His profile: for his whole life he was always a business owner, mostly in production and printing. Loves making things with his hands, hobbyist woodworker. Not very digital - has a smartphone but you can't get him on a team discord for example. Lacks any organisation skills which is always compensated by the people he hires.

My profile: 17 years of digital communications & martech. Worked in corporations, NGOs and startups. Started & failed a few businesses, always with a partner, never alone.

The issue that I have is that my work experience makes me expect certain things to be true - that we all have a common agreement on how things work, how we manage our time and mutual tasks, how we sync priorities and so on. And in this case I am always hitting a stone. My first reactions were a little bit patronising, where I go into "explain management" mode and although I am getting some things through I feel that it is not an effective method cause it is slow and also external for him, leaving the agency and responsibility to me.

So I am looking for something that would describe the co-founder dynamics, co-management, syncing, time-management and so on. I want to just give it to him as a recommended read and then we will have some basis on which to build and discuss, an external authority and structure of things, that is better than my own experience.

(Edit: the intention of giving a text is establishing a common ground of basic terminology and knowledge on the topic/s over which then we can have conversations and sync our intentions. My problem until now hasn't been so much total denial for cooperation but more of a lack of common language to facilitate this. So, no - giving him something to read would not be accepted as patronising, he would gladly accept. The alternative is long lectures from me and I don't think I am so well prepared or structured.)

You don’t go into a lot of detail except to say that you hit a stone. The first thing that comes to mind is that he is literally stonewalling you — this is a term that describes a dysfunctional emotional tactic in relationships.

I don’t think you have a knowledge problem. You have an emotional and relationship problem, which is far more complex, and requires different tools and skills. For some people, for example, they shut down (and stonewall) when the task at hand or the area under discussion overwhelms them, or makes them feel inadequate, or mirrors something from their childhood, or or or — the possibilities are literally endless.

I’m going to assume you didn’t sign up to be this guy’s therapist. But if he’s not meeting you halfway in trying to engage with these issues, even by just acknowledging that these are issues, you have to find some way to speak to that.

I’m hoping other people have more specific advice for this situation, because my advice would be not to go into business with someone who doesn’t have the emotional regulation skills to handle failure with growth. (And stonewalling is absolute a sign of a lack of regulatory and relationship skills.) but correctly identifying the problem is probably the first step.

Then, build from there. You’re not going to get him to make a large change to, from his perspective, accommodate your need for structure.

Get a small whiteboard and make some kind of magnetic status system for jobs or whatever. Nothing that uses a single transistor or has a manual to explain it.

To echo a point from my other comment, if there is so much in terms of foundations that is missing, do you think maybe you should be reconsidering whether this person is the right cofounder for you?