If you aren’t playing from the partnership desk or with an online player you just met in the online lounge, it’s safe to assume that you have a little more time to spend with your bridge partner.

(It’s also safe to assume that if you aren’t married to your bridge partner, you’ll use your own judgment to determine how much of an amount of time spent here is healthy or useful to your bridge game – and if you’re not talking about bridge, you might want to cut back…)

A good partnership is like a well-oiled machine: They work together as two separate parts, but also as a unit. Being able to synchronize your playing, thinking and bidding efforts is essential – and the one is up a muddy creek without a paddle without the efforts of their partner.

There’s a lot that you can do together with your bridge partner to ensure a better, stronger partnership at the table.

Even before the days of bridge when I was still getting used to playing poker, blackjack and chess, I’d spend time getting to know my partner or opponent in whatever game I was taking on before the game started.

Here are practical exercises for better partner synchronization.

Talk Conventions

Sometimes conventions are regional, sometimes they stick in your head just because that’s the way your club, teacher or parents used to play it. Get to know the way your partner thinks about bridge conventions beforehand and you should have a better idea of where they might be coming from in their overall thought process.

Are they traditional? Non-traditional? Polish? Bidding conventions differ from one person to the next. Ask your partner about theirs, explain yours and just overall talk about it.

It can be one of the most important things for making sure you’re on the same page.

Kibitz – Each Other

Encourage your bridge partner to record the games they play online – and get into the habit of sharing this footage back-and-forth. Watching your partner at play (without you present as partner or opponent in the game!) can teach you a lot about how they react in situations, and how they’re going to react in games with you.

Become Opponents

If you want to get to know your bridge partner really well, switch up the game and turn them into your opponent. Play chess, play euchre, play backgammon – play whatever you like as long as it’s a game of strategy, card or board where you’re up against one another as opponents rather than partners.

It’s truly incredible how much this can reveal about their playing patterns and their reactions during the game (as well as their general demeanor when they win or lose).

Get to know your bridge partner as an opponent and you’ll both walk out of it as closer bridge partners (or realize why you have to find others).

Play More BBO

Increasing the rate of online games that you and your partner play will make setup times shorter and cut down on traveling: This allows for more convenient and more frequent practice bridge games where a computer does most of the shuffling and scoring on your behalf. As they say, practice is what makes the partnership.

Seek Help

Sure, some partnerships are going to need some more help than others. That’s fine, and that’s where good teachers come in. If you feel like either you or your partner could use a little bidding or playing help that you aren’t getting elsewhere, it might be time to look at finding a bridge teacher as a partnership – and you’ll both be better players for it.