How to Run a Business With Your Spouse (Without Ruining Your Marriage)
Why Systems Matter When You Run a Business With Your Spouse
Learn how to run a business with your spouse without burning out your marriage. Build better systems at home and work to protect your time, money, and sanity.
Running a business with your spouse can be the best thing you ever do for your family, or the fastest way to burn out your marriage. And in the latest episode of All Things LOCS (Leadership, Operations, Culture, Strategies for Growth), we sat down with two people who have mastered the art of balancing both their business relationship and their personal relationship at a remarkably high level.
In this episode, we interviewed Amanda and David Fornelli, founders of The Systems Academy and highly respected real estate entrepreneurs who have built multiple own businesses while raising young children. Their story offers a powerful, practical look at how to run a business with your significant other as a business owner, without sacrificing your relationship, your health, or your long-term goals.
Amanda and David shared how they systemized their home life, strengthened their marriage, created operational clarity inside their businesses, established work life balance, maintained a healthy divide between their professional life and home life, and made tough financial decisions together, all while applying the same frameworks they teach inside The Systems Academy.
Whether you’re a healthcare practice owner, entrepreneur, or leader trying to scale your operations without creating friction among family members or destroying your personal life, these lessons will help you build a business and a relationship that truly support each other.
Systems at Home: Your Hidden Competitive Advantage as Married Entrepreneurs
Many leaders obsess over systems in their business, but then they want to improvise at home. Think about it: you want to create efficiencies and improve productivity at work, so why not do the same thing at home?
The Fornelli's do the opposite.
“In addition to treating our business like a real business… we treat our marriage like a real business as well.”
Weekly “CEO Meetings” for Your Marriage
Instead of hoping the week “just works out,” they run their family like a high-functioning organization:
Regular financial meetings as a couple
Weekly calendar meetings to align schedules
Childcare mapped on a shared calendar (who’s coming, when, and for how long)
Clear awareness of who is “on point” at different times
“When those things are covered,” they explain, “the rest of the stuff becomes a little bit easier.”
For healthcare owners and entrepreneurs, this is huge. Most burnout doesn’t come from the business itself; it comes from the collision of:
unpredictable home demands
unpredictable work demands
and zero intentional planning around either
Treating your marriage like a “real business” isn’t about making it cold or corporate. It’s about giving the most important relationship in your life the structure and respect you already give your company. For example, I used to be one of those people who thought having a 'date night' with your spouse was ridiculous. That is until my wife and I found ourselves spending less quality time together as we worked on building a business. Guess who has a date night night now?
Outsource and Automate at Home Like You Do at Work
They also apply standard business wisdom to their personal life:
“Another thing that we do is outsource and automate… having people to help us clean our home, getting our groceries delivered. Just delegating as much as possible in addition to having our regular meetings is really where I think we see some success.”
That’s a leadership and operations principle:
Protect your highest-value time
Reduce decision fatigue
Remove low-impact tasks from your plate
If you’re a clinic owner, CEO, or founder still doing everything at home plus everything at work, you’re not being a hero; you’re slowly becoming the bottleneck everywhere. Many people look at task delegation through the eyes of how much money it costs, instead of hours saved or relationships improved.
Question for you: If you could reclaim 5 hours per week, what could you do with the time?
Parenting Under Pressure: Building Equanimity as a Leadership Superpower
When kids enter the picture, everything changes. Duh, right? However, many business owners don't prepare for the massive change that is about to come. But what if having children made you a better leader?
Suddenly, you’re leading teams on five hours of sleep with a toddler crying in the background and a Slack channel blowing up.
They don’t sugarcoat it:
“We’re up every other night, and we’re still performing. In some ways, being a parent has made us tougher… when stuff is chaotic in business and it feels like everything is against us, those same moments of chaos happen, and we have to put ourselves in moments of clarity.”
What Equanimity Looks Like for Married Entrepreneurs
They use a word that doesn’t get discussed enough in business:
“One thing that we preach, and we’re constantly working on getting better at, is equanimity—the ability to stay calm in a very stressful situation, whether personal, business, or other.”
That’s leadership at the nervous-system level.
They lean on:
Self-awareness and mindfulness practices
A deliberate morning routine (“If we can win the morning, we can win the day.”)
Starting the day proactive, not reactive
Reframing business problems: “We feel like it’s the worst thing in the world… in reality, it’s probably going to be okay.”
For healthcare leaders dealing with denials, staffing crises, or patient complaints, that skill is everything. The more chaotic the environment, the more valuable your ability to slow time down, think clearly, and prioritize and execute.
As he puts it, referencing Extreme Ownership from Jocko Willink:
“When stuff is chaotic… we have to think, ‘Okay, what is really going on right now, and how can we best handle this?’”
Overstimulation, Overwhelm, and the Mental Health Survival Toolkit
Every parent–entrepreneur knows the feeling:
Kids screaming.
Phone ringing.
Slack pinging.
A true “dumpster fire” day where you are wondering what the hell you were thinking of running a business and having children.
So what do they do in those overstimulated moments?
“Sometimes there’s nothing we can do but take a break… as much as the mindfulness practices we practice, sometimes we just need a break.”
Tag-Team Leadership at Home
One of their most powerful “systems” is simply knowing when to step in for each other:
“If he sees me and I look overstimulated and he’s calm, he’ll take over, and vice versa. That’s the benefit of having a good partner… we know when to acknowledge, ‘Oh my gosh, this person is overstimulated, let me step in and help out.’”
They also:
Verbally name what they’re feeling (“Hey, I need some help.”)
Use breathing tools personally.
And they even teach their two-year-old to verbalize frustration and use deep breaths.
That’s culture in action: modeling emotional regulation for each other, your team, and your kids.
Why Scheduled Alone Time Is a System, Not a Luxury
They also schedule time apart on purpose:
“I give her her time, and she gives me my time too… Even if it’s 20–30 minutes. On a Sunday she’ll give me four hours to go with the boys and do my hobbies. And I make sure to give her her time so she can go to pilates and hang out with her girls.”
This isn’t indulgence; it’s systematized mental health.
When leaders never “re-fill their cup,” they bring resentment, reactivity, and exhaustion into both the home and the business. For a healthcare owner with a full patient schedule and a growing team, scheduled recovery is not optional; it’s operational strategy.
Communication and Respect: Don’t Talk to Your Spouse Worse Than Your Boss
Working with your spouse magnifies communication habits, both good and bad.
One moment from the transcript hits hard:
“She said something so brilliant… ‘Would you talk to your boss that way?’ And I said, ‘Uh, no.’ And she said, ‘Why are you talking to me that way?’”
Most leaders would be fired if they spoke to their boss or key partner the way they occasionally speak to their spouse.
But at home, walls are down, filters are gone, and stress leaks out sideways.
The fix isn’t perfection; it’s awareness and ownership:
Recognize when tone slips
Call each other in, not just out
Remember: your spouse is your most important business partner if you’re building together
They’re honest that:
“We’ve had a lot of disagreements about business decisions… but we’re learning to trust each other’s decisions and allow each other to make mistakes and be okay with that.”
That’s high-level leadership: trusting your partner enough to let them make a call, and live with the outcome together.
Data Over Ego: Making Hard Financial Decisions Together
When market conditions changed, they made the hard call to sell several Airbnbs.
Not because it felt right. Because the numbers and the opportunity cost demanded it.
“I think you’d agree when I say the most important thing for us is the opportunity cost. What can we be doing with this amount of time, energy, and money? Can we generate a better ROI by getting rid of this portfolio?”
They also call out a common vanity trap:
“People keep assets for the wrong reasons… Everyone loves to say their number of doors. Some people are so quick to increase door count that maybe you purchased the asset wrong.”
Healthcare translation:
It’s not about how many locations you have; it’s about whether those locations are actually generating healthy margins without destroying your culture.
They deliberately strip emotion out of the decision:
Project 5–10 years forward
Use tools (including AI) to model scenarios
Remove vanity metrics
Ask: “If we redeployed this energy and capital, would we be better off?”
That’s financial strategy as a leadership practice, not just a spreadsheet exercise. The best decisions are made with information and data, not opinions and emotions.
The LEAN Framework: Building a Real Business With Your Spouse
Most owners say they “need better operations” but have no idea where to start.
Their answer is simple and scalable: the LEAN framework.
“What we find… is most people own a job, they don’t have a true business. They’re working in their business, still trading their time for money, instead of building processes to outsource and automate.”
L – Lay the Foundation: Org Charts, Roles, and Documentation
Start with organization:
What departments actually exist? (Marketing, acquisitions, operations, finance, etc.)
Do you have a clear org chart?
Are roles and responsibilities defined in writing?
What does your back office look like? Is anything documented?
“If it’s not documented, it doesn’t exist, because it won’t pass the pass-down test.”
If you gave your clinic, agency, or company to your family tomorrow, would they inherit a machine—or a mess?
E – Establish the Processes: SOPs That Save Your Sanity
Once you know who does what, you define how they do it:
SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures)
Checklists
A master SOP directory everyone can access
Standard workflows for things like:
intake and onboarding
scheduling
billing and collections
marketing campaigns
reporting
A – Automate and Delegate: Stop Being the Bottleneck
Only after things are clearly defined do you:
Automate with technology
Delegate to team members or vendors
Free up leadership time for strategy instead of constant firefighting
This is where CRMs, EMRs, project management tools, and automations actually pay off. You’re not automating chaos, you’re automating clarity.
N – Nurture and Optimize: KPIs for Married Entrepreneurs
The last step is about measurement and refinement:
“N is nurture and optimize—that’s your KPIs. How are you looking at your business from a 30,000-foot view and making it better? Where are the bottlenecks? Where can you eliminate inefficiencies?”
Without KPIs and a regular review rhythm, even good systems decay over time.
The Systems Scorecard: A Simple Way to See Where You Actually Stand
To make this practical, they created a simple diagnostic: the System Scorecard.
“It’s 10 areas in your business… Each question has five answers. The top answer is, ‘I do it all myself.’ The last answer is, ‘I have this fully systematized and automated.’”
That snapshot tells them:
Where the owner is still a technician
Where they’re stuck in day-to-day work
Where they’re already thinking as a visionary and owner
From there, they can prioritize:
Build processes in the most overloaded area first
Delegate low-value work
Create a plan to move from “I do it all” to “this runs without me”
For healthcare leaders, a similar scorecard might evaluate:
Patient flow
Scheduling and cancellations
Billing and collections
Hiring and onboarding
Leadership and feedback culture
Financial dashboards and KPIs
The point is the same: you can’t improve what you don’t measure.
Why Most Entrepreneurs Avoid Operations (Even When They Know Better)
Here’s the uncomfortable truth: most owners know operations matter. They just don’t do the work.
“People say, ‘I know I should do it. I know operations is a thing.’ But there’s so much out there, they don’t know where to begin, and they don’t want to make a mistake.”
They see two main problems:
Knowledge without execution
“You can listen to podcasts, buy someone’s course, and know what to do. Executing on that is the challenging part.”
Overwhelm and fear
Owners get stuck in comparison and information overload:
“Grant Cardone says 10X, this person says something else… If I pick the wrong approach, I might go backwards.”
Their solution is beautifully simple:
“If we can decrease the time from idea to implementation, we’re going to be more successful and make more money.”
They also refuse to accept “I don’t know where to start” as a valid excuse:
“That is a crappy excuse because you have access to so much information… All you have to do is go and do it. And people don’t even do that.”
Culture, Motivation, and Celebrating Wins as a Couple and a Company
Ambitious founders are notoriously bad at celebrating. They set huge goals and only celebrate when they hit the goal; even then it's usually for about 5 minutes and then on to the next goal.
Amanda and David admit they’re guilty too:
“We’re so freaking ambitious… we hit a lot of goals, but because we don’t hit all of them, we’re so hard on ourselves.”
To fight that, they:
Treat their System Scorecard like a report card
Revisit it regularly
Track how far they’ve come, not just how far they have to go
Intentionally celebrate wins, even small ones
As Amanda puts it:
“I’ve been trying to focus more on the journey and the experience… how we are improving 1% every day.”
From a culture perspective, especially in healthcare organizations where burnout is high, this matters significantly.
Teams stay longer and perform better in environments where:
progress is visible
wins are acknowledged
leaders are human, not just demanding
You don’t need balloons and confetti. You need a consistent rhythm of:
“Here’s what we set out to do. Here’s what we actually did. Here’s what we’re proud of.” In addition, when we set big goals, there is a good chance that it doesn't get hit. However, what many of us fail to do is celebrate the progress that is made along the way. The growth of your team is worth celebrating.
“Serious and Broke” or “Cheesy and Rich”? Choosing Results Over Image
One of the most memorable lines from the conversation comes when they talk about leaders who think celebrating wins or doing personal development is “cringe.”
“Would you rather be broke and serious or cheesy and rich? I’ll choose cheesy and rich all day long.”
It’s a funny line, but there’s real strategy underneath it.
The “serious and broke” leader avoids new habits, coaching, and culture-building because it feels uncomfortable.
The “cheesy and rich” leader is willing to look silly if it means building a business and life that actually works.
They’ll clap in meetings.
They’ll go to therapy.
They’ll attend events with their spouse.
They’ll implement scorecards and SOPs.
They’ll celebrate progress.
What's more important to you? Worrying about other people's judgements or creating the life and business you always wanted?
Action Plan: How to Run a Business With Your Spouse Without Burning Out
If you’re an entrepreneur or healthcare practice owner running a business with a spouse (or just trying to protect your family while you build), here’s how to apply these lessons this month:
Schedule a weekly “family ops” meeting.
Review calendars, childcare, big events, and finances.
Treat it like you’d treat a leadership meeting with your executive team.
Pick one area of your life to outsource.
Cleaning, groceries, lawn care—free up 3–5 hours this month.
Define your mental health survival toolkit.
What do you do in moments of overstimulation?
Who takes over when you’re maxed out? Make that explicit with your spouse.
Audit your tone.
Ask yourself, “Would I talk to my boss this way?”
If not, your spouse doesn’t deserve it either.
Run a simple System Scorecard on your business.
List 10 areas (marketing, operations, finance, hiring, etc.).
Rate each 1–5: from “I do it all myself” to “fully systematized and automated.”
Choose one process to document this week.
Intake, onboarding, scheduling, billing; pick one.
Write the step-by-step. Use that as your first real SOP.
Celebrate three wins every Friday.
Personally and as a team.
Train your brain (and your culture) to see progress, not just gaps.
Because at the end of the day, as they summed it up so well:
“When you have the right systems in your personal life and in your business life, it actually really just creates more freedom.”
And that’s the real goal: not just a business that thrives, but a life, a marriage, and a family that thrive right along with it.
Running a business with your spouse is not for the faint of heart, but as Amanda and David Fornelli shared on All Things LOCS, it becomes dramatically easier when you have the right systems driving every area of your life. Their strategies for communication, operations, decision-making, and emotional regulation aren’t just helpful; they’re transformational.
If you’re a healthcare practice owner, entrepreneur, or leader ready to improve your operations, strengthen your culture, and lead with more clarity, this episode is a must-listen.
👉 Tune in to the full episode of All Things LOCS to hear Amanda and David’s full framework.
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👉 Share the episode with a business-owning couple who needs this.
Because when your systems improve, everything improves; your business, your marriage, and your quality of life.
