How to Develop Strong Family Business Successors - Don't Fall Victim to the "Rescue Syndrome"

I doubt there will be any disagreement that parenting is a challenge. Surely anyone who has been privileged with offspring will agree. As a succession planner who is uniquely positioned within many families who are collaborating in business, I can affirm that bringing children into a family business greatly elevates the challenge of parenting. Family business is an oxymoron because family is an institution of unconditional acceptance whereas business is a institution of conditional performance.  As a result, being a parent can become even more challenging because, you can’t run a family like a business and you can’t run a business like a family.  As if the challenge of raising a child were not enough, the family business environment creates a constantly changing rule book. This can often lead parents to believe that the only hope for a child’s success comes with divine guidance toward a prayerful balance between unconditional love and performance accountability. To read the end of this article, click here.

Successor Development: You've Selected Your Successor, Now What?

Now that you have successfully selected your successor, what do you do? If you’re developing a family member successor, the most important thing is to have them go work somewhere else before entering the family business. Learning how to be an employee in a place where your last name means nothing is very valuable. To read the ending to this article, click here.

Successor Development: 5 Key Indicators for Evaluating a Successor

Once there are available successor candidates, business owners should take a less instinctive approach to selecting a successor from the candidates by evaluating some key traits. We refer to these traits as the 5 Cs: Character, Confidence, Capability, Competence, and Community. First and foremost is Character. A viable successor candidate should have a strong work ethic and an attitude of earning his way. They should have respect for the people that work for you and value them as great contributors to the business, not as pawns in your play. They should be an upstanding individual with integrity and a commitment to doing the right thing. To read the end of this article, click here.