Friendships in middle age!
People think great relationships are built during childhood!
- Sometimes at school
- Sometimes during college
- Sometimes when we start our careers!
But can you build a great relationship with someone at the age of 50+?
Most will utter no but it’s not actually true!
People believe that at that stage of life, relationships become transactional!
When Bob Iger (CEO of Disney) planned to acquire Pixar he had to reach out to Steve Jobs who didn’t have a great relationship with Disney due to business dealings going wrong a few years earlier!
Bob Iger spent countless hours with Steve and was eventually able to convince him and his co-founders at PIXAR and thus the biggest acquisition ever in the animation industry took place.
Steve Jobs died 6 years later and both he and Bob Iger became great friends in those 6 years!
(Read the book, The Ride of a Lifetime by Bob Iger to know more about their great friendship).
So the next time anyone tells you that you can’t build great relationships in your middle age, don’t give an ear to that needless advice.
You never know when that friend will land up in your life. Just remember to honour your words and you will be able to develop relationships at any point in time!
Most importantly never keep anything hidden. Relationships suffer when you hide stuff.
Being transparent was one of the reasons why Bob Iger and Steve Jobs’ relationship became so strong even though they knew each other only for 6 years!
Trust and Transparency are the keywords in creating lifetime relationships!
