The most enduring, and some of the most successful, businesses in the world are family businesses. These businesses rely on each generation creating the next generation of leaders.
Active Knowledge Questions:
How do you approach creating the next generation of leaders in your family and business?
Have you thought about what this process may involve?
In each generation, new family businesses are formed, grown and often sold off as it is felt no one in the next generation wants to take them over.
Even when a family manages to transition the family business to the next generation, the trend is for the business to falter and fail. The expression ‘shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations’ captures this common occurrence and exists in every culture around our world.
Creating, building and sustaining a business that transitions from generation to generation is hard continuous work. As is running a successful family business. The enduring benefit, however, to be won by a family in being able to transition a successful business, far outweighs the benefit of passing over an investment portfolio.
There is proven wisdom in how to transition a business across generations that significantly increases the likelihood of its success. But no business will survive if it is not led by worthy leaders who have developed the essential character traits.
In every family, leadership should be conscious and deliberate. It starts with your example and is displayed from the moment your child is born into your family. By the time your child is possibly interested in joining the family business, your example as a leader will be well established. This is an important point to keep in mind, as a parent you have a significant influence on who your children become as people and, therefore, as leaders.
Over the next few weeks, we are going to explore what leadership in family businesses looks like, drawing on the hard-learnt lessons of some of Australia’s most successful business leaders.
An entirely new level of performance.
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All the best in the success of your business,
Richard Shrapnel
