Relationships with colleagues, employees, bosses, and even customers are a negotiation. It can be a mistake to forget this. The longer you work with someone the more likely it is that the way you will get the best from each other will evolve and change.

As the needs of the organisation and individuals change, the way you need to work together will change too. It can be easy to forget this and fall back on familiar patterns or untested assumptions.

In additional to the usual mechanics of individual performance reviews, sometimes it is a wise investment to review how you work with each key individual.

Some great questions to ask each other:

• How does the business need us to change our relationship in order to deliver the strategy?
• Are there things which we could fully delegate to each other without requiring decision-making or discussion?
• Are there ways we can improve how we use each other’s time?
• What kind of feedback do we need to give each other to stay on course?
• Is the balance of support and challenge right in our relationship?
• Is there a way we could use the knowledge we have of each other to support additional honesty and learning for each other?
• What action can I commit to which would improve your experience of working with me?

Not to suck all the romance out of it, but some of these are questions which could benefit almost any long-term relationship!