I’m excited to share a new family business educational program in the greater New York City area: New York City Family Enterprise Center ( NYCFEC ). This fall, NYCFEC will open its doors with the 2017 Family Business Day on Friday, September 15th. This will be followed by five, half-day, in-depth NYCFEC Elective courses and I’ll be starting off at the “very beginning” by presenting: Raising Family Business Children (0-14 years of age) . I’m a firm believer that it is never too early to develop your family with intention. If you are part of a family enterprise in Read more »
enterprising families
Trusts Take Over the World
OK, “take over the world” may be a bit much. However, trusts are a very popular vehicle used more and more in estate planning for business families and legacy wealth families. And the downsides are often not discussed. On the benefits side of the equation when transferring assets through trusts are reducing estate and gift tax liabilities, creditor/lawsuit protection (future divorce is often cited), and determining when heirs get their inheritance, how much they get and for what purposes it Read more »
The Power of Failure (Patti Smith and Adele)
If you’ve been reading my blog over time, you’ll know that I like to relate my posts to famous musicians. Keep reading to see how Patti Smith and Adele fit into this month’s post. I work with families that want their wealth to serve current and future generations in healthy and productive ways. Some family clients have active operating businesses and others have legacy wealth and in both cases the assets are often complex. Regardless of the form the wealth Read more »
The Power of Family Stories: Part II
In November of 2016 I wrote about the power of family stories and shared my family’s Thanksgiving experience as my Aunt Lee told of her Holocaust survival experiences and her live-in aide shared similar experiences living through the civil war in Liberia. This month I’ll tell you about some interesting research linking family story-telling style to self-esteem in preadolescents and offer my thoughts on the ramifications for raising children within a context of family wealth. Bohanek et al (2006) in their article, “ Family Narrative Interaction and Children’s Sense of Self ”, discuss Read more »
Strawberry Fields
I recently came across a NY Times article about musicians fighting over who gets to play (and collect tips) at Strawberry Fields, the memorial to John Lennon in Central Park. The situation strongly reminded me of challenges my family clients face. It is so essential for families who share assets across generations to take the time to decide HOW they will share the rights and responsibilities that come with ownership, management and leadership. And, they still need to manage being a family in Read more »
Family Business Founder Blindness
Entrepreneurs tend to be motivated, intense, creative, assertive and self-assured. Very self-assured, in fact – particularly when they have been successful growing a company (or several) and achieving the financial rewards that come with it. They tend to trust their guts which makes some sense since their guts have often steered them the right way- at least in business. That is the rub. The skills and intuition related to starting and growing a business are frequently not the same as Read more »
Children of the 1%
I realize there may not be widespread empathy for the challenges and issues facing children of wealthy families, and especially children of the so-called 1% – those in the upper 1% of household wealth. However, I would like to give voice to an issue wealthy parents should be thinking about and finding ways to speak to their kids about: the strong bias against children of the wealthy. This does not necessarily mean only the ultra-high net worth or even high Read more »
Family Business Learning Opportunity
I am writing to offer enterprising families a great opportunity for learning and development. The Family Firm Institute (“FFI”) is a professional association for educators, researchers, consultants and allied professionals serving family businesses and wealthy families. In a nutshell, families sharing ownership, management and leadership of shared assets across generations. FFI has study groups around the country and I am part of an active and vibrant group which alternates meeting between Philly and Princeton. Recently we decided to try something new and we invited a Read more »
UVM Global Family Enterprise Case Competition
This coming Saturday, January 16, I am honored to be invited back for the third year in a row to act as a judge for the University of Vermont Global Family Enterprise Case Competition (FECC) . The natural beauty of Burlington, Vermont is a great reason for me to trek up north and when combined with the intellectual stimulation of serious, smart and interesting undergraduate and graduate students competing on 24 teams from top institutions of family business education in 10 countries – it is one of my favorite Read more »
Family Business Questions for 2016
It is that time of year when we tend to look back and review what has transpired, for better or worse, while looking toward the future with the hope of learning from past lessons so we grow going forward. Here are the top two questions I routinely pose to business families. Sometimes I’ll ask these outside of any specific context simply to see how families respond. Other times I’ll ask as families are struggling with a very specific challenge: How Read more »