Want to Get Management More Involved In Developing Ideas? Try the Incubator Approach

When it comes to creativity, most of us have won the genetic lottery.  Trouble is, most of us get trapped in a “good enough” comfort zone, even when “good enough” isn’t.  It’s not that we don’t have the tools to grapple with business, family, and succession problems and challenges; it’s that we have chosen to use someone else’s best practices.  That can be a fatal flaw when it comes to succession planning. Click here to read the end of this blog.

Why Employee Contracts Are So Important to the Succession Planning Process

Business Structuring is a critical factor of the interdependent Succession Matrix®. Business Structuring impacts the nine other factors of the Succession Matrix® and accordingly, those other nine factors positively or negatively impact Business Structuring. For more information on all ten factors, refer to the International Succession Planning Association website at www.ISPAssociation.org.  To read the end of this blog, click here.

Debate vs Brainstorming - Which One Actually Generates the Results You Want

Some people like to think out loud.  In fact, they must talk in order to think.  They love brainstorming; it’s how they create their map of reality.  The problem is that they think everyone else has to engage in the same technique in order to have an abundance of good ideas.  As a result, they subject whatever group they happen to be playing with – family, business, community – to the same process of “out loud” and “out of the box” thinking. Click here to read the end of this blog.

Succession Planning: Seven Steps to Getting Buy-In

When working with family-owned and privately held business owners on their succession plans, getting others to buy-in to your ideas is often needed. Dan Schneider, one of my partners, has written this post below to help guide us in achieving buy-in. We talk a lot about the need for buy-in.  Most of us understand the value of willing cooperation, and we struggle mightily to actually have it come about.  If it’s such a valuable concept, why is it so hard to achieve? A UK colleague, David Molden, talks about the pitfalls as Foisting, Preaching, and Prescribing.  Presenting an untested idea to people whose basic approach to life is “show me” is one of the more difficult ways to get people positively excited about your latest and greatest next new thing.  Equally ineffective is believing that your excitement and emotional attachment are shared by others who may have alternative solutions.  Prescription, the use of unilateral power, is a dangerous default.  So what seven steps are likely to help you become more effective in business leadership, family governance, and succession planning?  Consider using this approach the next time you need “buy-in”. Listen and Learn.  If you want buy-in you have to establish rapport with the people you need.  You do that by listening more than by talking. Show that you understand.  Repeat to your audience your understanding of their values and beliefs.  The more they believe they are understood, the more rapport you will establish and the more they will be willing to consider what you have to say. Distinguish between results and methods.  It’s generally easier to get agreement on results and outcomes than it is on steps and techniques.  If you insist on having everything your way, you may go home with nothing more than malicious compliance. Be flexible.  If the last few years have taught us anything, it’s that funny things happen on the way to the forum.  Learn to adjust easily and quickly to changing circumstances. Integrate your ideas with the way things are done.  Many times change is introduced as something to be done in addition to everything else on someone’s plate.  As busy as the world is today, not very many people are in the market for more to do.  They’re even less likely to look for new ways to do things that require what they consider dramatic change. Make a compelling case.  Most of us have no problem with logic, we just don’t use it.  Most people buy on emotion, not on reason.  Provide enough information to satisfy the skeptics, and remember to tie your reasons to one of the four factors that influence a decision:  Pride, Pleasure, Peace of Mind, and Profit.  The more connections you make to these four factors, the greater your chances of getting buy-in. Finish with a call for action and commitment.  If you don’t get it, then you need to go back to step 1 and work on building more rapport.  Resistance is almost always a sign of a lack of rapport, which is a form of connection.  If you haven’t connected, you need to ask a few more questions and pay close attention to the answers.  Reframe your approach, and play the game again.  In short, you cannot talk your way into buy-in.  You can only listen your way in.

Family Business Harmony – Remembering to Forget

My final thought on why some families are more effective at achieving harmony and unity is that successful families dwell more in the present than in the past. As even the presumed role model families will admit, it is not always hunky dory on the family front. The fundamental family motivation is “the good of the present outweighs the bad of the past”. My encouragement and advice to clients seeking family harmony and unity is to “remember to forget.” You have choices. To read the end of this blog, click here.

How Emotions Can Triumph Over Reason

Whoa! I was totally not prepared for the meeting I just had with my client. I thought I was. In fact, I was very prepared based upon our last meeting and all the decisions that had been made.  However, life, and clients, have a way of throwing you curve balls. Sybil showed up again! The bottom line is that I came into this meeting ready to facilitate the client making some substantial asset transfers to his youngest son – it was supposed to be a slam dunk. The transfer was going to be of B-Member units in a real estate LLC.  The transfer was for tax planning purposes and to bring the youngest son up to parity with his older brothers on transfers that the father had previously made to them. The transfer would have had no impact whatsoever on the client’s control of the asset or on his income. Simple, right? No brainer, right? To read the end of this blog, click here.

Family Business: How Do I Play with My Predecessor's Team?

At some point in time, the ownership and leadership batons are going to be passed to the next generation.  When that happens, there's going to be some level of trauma for everyone involved, including the new owner/leader.  When the company becomes "yours", it comes with a team of leaders and advisors that you may or may not like and whom you may or may not trust.  If you are the successor, how do you make the best of this situation? Click here to read the end of this blog.

Family Business Harmony – It’s Not an Inalienable Right

To continue my thoughts on how to find family harmony, I think the second thing we all need to remember about  family unity is that none of us have a right or entitlement to a loving, supportive, unified family. Family love and support is not an inalienable right. I contend that outstanding family business relationships, just like outstanding businesses, are achieved as the byproduct of a mystical commodity known as hard work. Those who want to achieve family and business success work beyond the pain to achieve the gain. And if you have not had a dose of reality lately, just trust me when I tell you that wherever there are relationships, there will be pain. To read the end of this blog, click here.

Living in Dad's Shadow

“My father is so good at everything he does.  Everything he touches seems to turn into gold.  He is revered by his employees and respected in the community. I am not sure I will ever be as good as my father!” These were recent sentiments shared with me by the child of a successful business owner. Have you ever wondered what it would be like being a son or daughter in a successful family-owned business? On one hand, the perception is that it is such a blessing since business success affords the opportunity to enjoy some of the finer things in life. On the other hand, being the son or daughter in a family business can be quite challenging because the microscope is always upon you and at times it appears surpassing Dad’s or Mom’s accomplishments is insurmountable. Click here to read the end of this blog.

Keys for Resolving Conflict in the Family Business

Recently one of my partners and I were facilitating a meeting between a father and his daughter to work through some mismatched expectations between them in the family business. We had already had several prep meetings laying the ground-work for aligning their expectations, which were all positive and headed in the right direction. They were both excited that we were going to be able to help them get some things out on the table as they typically would avoid one another and leave issues unresolved. Click here to read the end of this blog.