Throughout the month, Coach Pete seeks out strong players in the family business world in order to bring you real stories of real family business professionals to inspire, drive and lead you forward. From the stories of legacy builders to examples of outstanding succession planning, the star players Coach Pete comes across are navigating the game with confidence and wisdom. Check out a few of the Coach’s Best Plays in this month’s roundup:
• Family business owners should think of succession planning as one of the fun things on their bucket list
In this article the author makes a great point about why so many entrepreneurs put off succession planning.
I am a firm believer in whatever you focus on you get more of.
It is a great point in this article about shifting your perspective from succession planning as the end of your life for your career but thinking of it as a part of your legacy, a part of your retirement income and a source of family pride. When you think of succession planning in that perspective you’re probably much more interested in getting it figured out!
• Be bold and fearless to take the family business to the next level
Read about Billy and Andrew Bauer and you hear about being aggressive, being fearless and winning the loyalty of the veteran players in the family business. The Bauer brothers “embrace a disruptive nature in business” and blaze their own trail at Royce Leather. Too many second and third generation family business successors are simply tending to what their predecessors started.
Great family business successors are courageous and willing to forget about everybody else’s expectations of them and make their own mark in the business world. Congratulations Billy and Andrew!
• Make sure you have a healthy identity that’s not totally reliant on your family business
A great article by Grant Goodwin that gives families many good things to think about: defining family values, understanding the family narrative, and creating your own identity outside the family business. My favorite part of the article was widely when the author suggests that younger generation members should ask themselves “who would you be and what would you be doing if the family business system were not here?”
We encourage all of our family businesses to have an employment policy for next Gens that requires them to go out and work professionally in corporate America as an important part of the process of becoming a confident and productive business professionals!
