Prosper through Partners - Synthenet Corporation

Prosper through partners

Rodney Capron Jr., founder of Synthenet Corp. in Northborough, Mass., initially embraced partnering as a means of outsourcing, but he’s encountered some unexpected benefits.

Capron’s Web-development company, which has 12 employees and generates $1.5 million in revenues, focuses on complex, Web-based solutions (CRM, e-commerce, Intranets). When two key free-lancers who Capron relied on were suddenly no longer available, he began to cultivate relationships with local ad agencies, which allowed him to tap graphics expertise without the overhead.

Not only have the partnerships brought in new business, they’ve also given Capron new insights. “Partnerships have helped us learn to charge more appropriately,” says Capron. “As a smaller company, you often become very friendly with clients and may not be charging for all the time you put into a project. By working with our partners, we’ve seen how larger companies are very accurate and methodical in the way they track their time. It was a big eye-opener for us.”

Capron has also gained perspective in determining market value: “When you’re a smaller company, you don’t want customers to get the impression your prices are exorbitant, yet you still want to earn their business. So nine times out of 10, you charge less than you should. Larger companies better understand their value - and how to present that value back to the client.”

Granted, a partnership is never smooth sailing. “The first couple of projects you do together can be frustrating and challenging,” observes Capron. “But when you get it right, it’s amazing how powerful a partnership can be. It’s like doubling the size of your company overnight in terms of your resources.”

A unified vision

The single biggest factor causing partnerships to fizzle and fracture seems to be lack of common vision.

In the mid-‘90s Rodney Capron Jr. started a Web-development company, which he folded into another firm with a friend. “Unfortunately, we had two completely different visions from the start,” says Capron. “My partner wanted a sales-training and multimedia company, but as time went on, the Web-development side started to take over everything.”

Tension mounted. “The more time I spent in the office, the less I liked my own business - and my partner,” recalls Capron. “It seemed like we fought whenever I was there, and the company started to divide because of this.” In 1998 Capron called it quits. Taking one employee and three accounts, he launched Synthenet Copr., a new Web-development company based in Northborough, Mass.

A process paves the way

Relinquishing control becomes easier when you’ve created systems. Creating formal procedures for his company’s back-end operations was an enlightening process, says Rodney Capron Jr., founder of Synthenet Corp., Northborough, Mass., a Web-development firm with $1.5 million in revenues.

“I brought in a consultant who helped me to realize that things weren’t happening correctly because I was too involved,” explains Capron. “I was trying to do sales, write code and do graphic design - all at the same time. My time was so fragmented that I wasn’t being effective at any one thing.”

Capron constructed a system that clearly defined what had to be done in a project and who was the best person to execute each step. “What was the big eye-opener,” says Capron. “I realized that there were people who were better than me for many of our operations - and I realized that we would never grow if I continues to be a bottleneck.”

Today Capron no longer designs or writes code; he’s trying to concentrate on being the company’s spokesperson, visionary and head of quality control.