International Friendship Day: Celebrating A Friendship (& Business Partnership)!
Posted: 30 July 2020 by Michele Jacobs
Reika and Simone have been balancing their friendship with their business partnership for close to a decade. Here are some of their tips and insights for a successful partnership:

1. Communicate regularly and clearly
Simone: “This is an obvious one, but can be often hard to execute effectively! Working in different offices, we’ve learnt to prioritise our catch ups and utilise technology to do so. Zoom is great as we get to see each other and we love staying connected, Covid-19 has created this connection for may others, however our business had been effectively zooming for quite some time now”.
2. Strong leadership that stands by core values
Reika: “We’ve always been firm believers in practicing what we preach, so we’re proud to lead Team derma by example.”
Simone: “We needed
“Each of us took time to write out our values and also a deep dive into our strengths and weaknesses not only as a business person but also our personal values that we live by each and every day. This too was an important part in our initial setting up our successful partnership”.

3. Understanding and revisiting long-term goals
Reika: “It is important to stay focused on our long-term goals amongst our daily to-do lists. Revisiting them always renews our focus and puts everything into perspective.”
Simone: “Still to this day 10 years on we bring these core values and our strengths and weakness to our annual directors meetings as a reminder and a guide during these planning sessions of what each other stands for, respects and believes in.
4. Not being afraid to depend on each other’s skills
Simone: “We both bring equal importance to the table, m
5. Define explicitly and carve out each individual role
Reika: “Being friends first, we knew each other’s strengths & weaknesses and our responsibilities formed naturally around these. We revisit the breakdown of responsibilities regularly, to see if there are ways we can improve our scope of work.”

6. Be courageous and believe you can do it together
Reika: “
Taking risks can be so hard, but weighing these up with a partner that has your back makes it a lot less scary!”
7. Identifying strengths and weaknesses which complement each other
Simone: “It’s also important to work on our weaknesses (and even our strengths) – we’re not about resting on our laurels!
8. Ensure to gain each others approval for business decisions
Simone: “Never, ever assume! This is a surefire way to create tension and mistrust.”
Reika: “

9. Teaching staff to understand the importance to the companies culture
Reika: “Our culture is our competitive advantage. Our advertising, marketing, training and techniques can all be copied (and they have been!) but a great culture is very hard to achieve and cannot be copied. It is unique to us and is our biggest selling point.”
10. Stick to your vision and share it with the broader team
Simone: “Our team at derma Aesthetics know exactly what we as a company are working towards, they even help to shape our vision and define our goals.”
Reika: “We’re so fortunate to be on this journey together! It’s pretty amazing to have someone that shares your passion and vision.
Simone: “Absolutely, we’re different in so many ways, but we are in sync when it counts!”


Want to know how these two started their skinship? Listen to our dermaviduals podcast in the series, “The Business Of Skin” here: