Don’t Think 50/50. Think 100.
Partnerships are hard. Being on teams can be a challenge. This lesson has always been a great one to help remind me of what makes great ones great and what leads some to implode.
This lesson speaks to effort and the concept of fairness.
Most people assume fairness means splitting things evenly. If you’re working on a project with someone, the instinct is to think, “I’ll do half, and they’ll do half.” That sounds fair, but it’s the wrong way to think about collaboration.
The problem with 50/50 is that it treats effort like a fixed quantity. But work isn’t like that. Real progress happens when everyone is all in—when they bring 100% of themselves to the table.
When you aim for 50/50, you spend too much time keeping score. Is this task yours or mine? Have I done my share? This kind of thinking slows you down. Worse, it creates resentment. No one ever feels like the split is perfectly even.
But when you aim for 100, everything changes. You stop worrying about what’s fair and just focus on doing what needs to be done. If your partner is all in too, you create something bigger than the sum of your parts.
Thinking 100 doesn’t mean doing all the work yourself. It means being fully invested in the outcome. You trust your partner to do the same, and you hold each other accountable—not by measuring effort, but by committing to the result.
Lesson Learned: The best collaborations don’t feel like 50/50. They feel like both sides are giving more than their share. And that’s when the magic happens.