Family (Business) Matters

For the past ten years, my partner and I have been in the business of providing consulting services to manufacturers and distributors of consumer products. My partner also happens to be my wife (who, by the way, is not Lisa Ashcraft, the lovely woman pictured at right).

It was only when we began to think about the life of our business that my wife, Gayle, and I realized that we've been operating a "family business" all these years. And when we reflected on the many clients we've served over the last decade, we realized that they, too, were mostly family businesses.

Almost anyone involved in business can identify clients, whether manufacturers, rep organizations, retailers, or vendor partners, that are comprised of family members or operate like a family. And just like families, family businesses go through periods of operating with Zen-like perfection, and others when they descend into chaotic dysfunction. Believe me, I know. I've worked with my wife for most of the 15 years we've been married, and we have a 5-year-old daughter and a 1-year-old son — all squeezed into a New York City-sized apartment!

In a recent conversation with a client — a family business involved in a diverse endeavors — I asked, "What is really the core business of your family?" He said, "The core business of our family is keeping our family together."

With all the challenges businesses face today, such as a soft economy, geo-political strife, war, and terrorism, I can't think of a more appropriate goal for a business than keeping the family together. And it makes no difference whether that "family" is comprised of blood relations, or simply co-workers that consider themselves kindred.

The heart of the question is, "How do you keep a business growing and operating profitably, while supporting the needs and goals of all the family members?"

One of the greatest challenges of running a family business is incorporating a second generation into day-to-day operations, because oftentimes second-generation family members will need to function with older relatives on a peer level. Especially when managed by a founding-generation member, the dynamics of parent-child-sibling relationships can add greatly to the challenge of running a business.

How can the first generation train and supervise the second generation in a professional way? The best method is to provide the youngsters with a supportive coaching environment. But that support and coaching should come from someone outside of the family (business) structure. A former client recently told me that the best thing he did when bringing his daughter into the business was to have an independent, industry-experienced coach give his daughter a "safe place" to learn the business, free from the family dynamics that inevitably cloud the process. As a result, she has flourished, the company is more successful, and the workplace relationship between father and daughter (owner and manager) is not hampered by family dynamics.

As Shakespeare and Freud knew so well, challenging aspects of intra-family relationships will always exist. Your goal should be to separate negative family frictions from the positive conflict that is a natural part of a growing business. In fact, it's likely that in my client's case, having an independent coach support the daughter's integration into the company also served to improve their relationship outside the business.

The caveat here is that not every family member is suited to be integrated into the family business. For example, Jimmy Carter couldn't find a position for his brother, Billy, in his administration. And frankly, I'm not sure Billy would have wanted a cabinet post in Jimmy's administration — even if it were White House Beverage Manager. It's as important to assess the desire of a family member to work in the business, as it is to assess their skill and aptitude. Sometimes it's just better to let family members be free to set their own course rather than demanding they follow along in the family business.

All companies strive to develop a management strategy that respects the goals of key staff. A comprehensive strategy needs to consider not only professional and career goals, but also personal goals. In an ideal employment model, employees can seamlessly link personal goals with professional aspirations. This takes on even more significance in a family business, where management has a personal stake in the fulfillment of employees' aspirations.

Whether or not they are family, meeting the personal goals of key employees will help satisfy their short term desires and make them better managers, with more to contribute to your company in the long run. For instance, adopting a flexible work schedule for the manager who wants to spend more time with family will show that you care about the manager's life outside of work. It would be no surprise to see that manager (family member) develop a more empathetic attitude toward the rest of the staff, which could result in increased employee satisfaction and reduced turnover.

All strategies for incorporating family and personal goals in the workplace have the potential to add to the cost of doing business, including lost productivity or lost time in the short run. But the added cost will come back to you if the plan is well thought out and executed. Keep the decisions you make smart and sensible for your business and your family. It's that balance between our professional and personal lives that we should strive to achieve. That's always been my goal.