When the Family Business Is a Sickness

Abstract

When a shared business retards the life‐cycle development of both generations, it may not be possible for consultants to “restore” their system to health as a family business, because it is unhealthy for such families to be in business together at all. Fantasies of saving their family business, or “succeeding” in passing it to the next generation, are misguided at best. The author argues that when parents’ ego development is inadequate, normal individuation makes them and their children so anxious that the business functions like an addiction. A primary role of the consultant is to recognize such cases, diagnose them carefully, and intervene in ways that encourage the next generation to explore a wider range of options.

A farewell to the business: Championing exit and continuity in entrepreneurial family firms

“…As observed by scholars such as Drozdow (1998) and Kaye (1996), family business literature seems to have an implicit bias in favor of continuity and persistence in the founder's business. This is explained by heavy emotional involvement and development of core competences over generations.…”

“…This may lead to a gradual identification with the business itself. Exit from the business would negatively influence family power, visibility, status and reputation within and outside the family (Malone, 1989;Kaye, 1996;Sirmon and Hitt, 2003). As a consequence, family members tend to postpone divestment decisions without searching for new entrepreneurial opportunities (Naldi et al, 2007).…”

“…Are there conditions under which continuity of past-anchored values and identities can trigger the emergence of future-focused change factors (Kaye, 1996;Mason and Harrison, 2006)? Systematic attention has not yet been directed to these issues (DeTienne, 2008;Sharma, 2004) -a task undertaken in this article.…”

Family business best practices: Where from and where to?

“…It is opportune, therefore, to ask whether continuity and succession are necessarily the main, or the only criteria of family business success. Kaye (1996) argued that outstanding financial performance and longevity were not the only criteria for family business success and listed the following additional criteria: both generations felt that the younger generation had made significant contributions to the business; they either passed the baton or made a good decision to sell the business, in which case they worked together to maximize its value; the process of getting there was personally rewarding for them, individually as well as collectively; there were no serious personal casualties along the way (p. 336). Accordingly, based on a consideration of what is in the best interests of the family and the business at the time critical decisions have to be made, both keeping and selling the business could be viable success options for families in business.…”

Modelos de planeación estratégica en las empresas familiares (Models of strategic planning in the family business).

“…El éxito en este caso no solo se mide por los resultados cuantitativos; el éxito de una empresa familiar, según Kaye (1996), está en función de si ambas generaciones creen que los sucesores han contribuido al éxito de la empresa, si transfirieron la empresa a la próxima generación o trabajaron juntas para venderla, o si la experiencia fue satisfactoria para determinadas personas y para la familia en su conjunto, o no hay bajas familiares a lo largo del camino.…”