Creating a Shared Vision
Getting to the heart of Successful Succession Planning

Presenter: Jim Reger
Format: Keynote and/or Workshop

Succession is the ultimate test of a family business. When they are successful, family businesses create a level of commitment and love for the business from family members, employees, customers, suppliers and other stakeholders that non-family businesses can seldom achieve. The family is perhaps the most reliable of all social structures for transmitting cultural values and practices across generations.

• Over 70% of family businesses do not survive to a second generation
• Over 90% do not survive to the third generation

At the heart of succession planning is the notion that a family can create a blueprint for the business which will outline its future strategic direction as well as the ownership and governance structures required for success. However, long before the details of this blueprint can be filled in, the family members need to formulate a shared dream – an empowering vision of the future, which all family members can embrace and which will form the basis of their collaboration and provide the motivation necessary to carry out the plan.

This session will explore the challenges faced by business families as they move through the life cycles from generation to generation – and will present some of the lessons learned about how to organize and deal with the special dynamics involved with succession and other unique family business issues.
Succession in family business involves the passing of a baton from one generational leader or team of leaders to the next generational leader or team. The tasks that must be accomplished before one generation can depart and the next generation can take charge, however, vary significantly, depending upon where the transition starts and where it is designed to end.

Succession planning is about opening the lines of communication between all family members and building bridges of trust, respect and goodwill that will yield the accountability and commitment required to work for the betterment of all stakeholders in the family business – and ultimately the family legacy.
As the statistics indicate, the resolution of many issues in a business family are so difficult that, more often than not, the family takes the easy way out – they do not discuss the issues at all, or if they do, it is in an unproductive and often destructive manner. One of the most effective ways of starting meaningful dialogue amongst the members of the family is to establish a Family Council, a structure designed to move the family towards thinking and behaving from a stewardship perspective.

The family council is a structure of the family, not of the business or shareholders. It honours the fact that all family members have a stake in issues of family identity – as current or future employees; current or future owners; or simply members of a family whose life is continuously affected by what happens in the business.

You will leave this session with a renewed sense of excitement and perspective regarding your business and your life – as well as some practical tools and processes for building a sustainable business family.