How to Properly Manage Succession Planning in Small Business and Family Business

 

“Call Me Irish but I don’t believe in Cooler Heads Prevailing”

The stereotypical temper of the Irish and those of Irish descent is most often somewhat unexpected, extremely passionate, and very short-lived.

In Family Business sometimes cooler heads don’t prevail. Main conflicts in Family Business include control, succession planning, performance and compensation issues.

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms. In 1923 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature as the first Irishman so honored for what the Nobel Committee described as “inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation.”

Yeats is generally considered one of the few writers who completed their greatest works after being awarded the Nobel Prize; such works include The Tower (1928) and The Winding Stair and Other Poems. In Family Business sometimes cooler heads don’t prevail. Main conflicts in Family Business include control and performance, compensation issues.

In the Tower Yeats included “Sailing to Byzantium — “That is no country for old men.” It uses a journey to Constantinople, Byzantium as a metaphor for a spiritual journey. Yeats explores his thoughts and musings on how mortality, art, and the human spirit may converge.

Through the use of various poetic techniques, Yeats’ “Sailing to Byzantium” describes the metaphorical journey of a man pursuing his own vision of eternal life as well as his conception of paradise. Some think he was writing of his own, aging and diminishing physical ability, skills.

In family business the leader, the entrepreneur, the founder wears many different roles. At times the second generation leader, owner has multiple roles. In 2012 Tony Navarro wrote a piece for the Young Entrepreneur Council, it discussed the four roles of the founder. Sometimes Founders may resemble Bert, from Mary Poppins. Do you recall the scene where he’s a one man band?

One of the skills founders need to learn is the release, the ability to let go. Early on the founder may be the Product manager, on the Technical team, on the Sales team and the CEO. One of the issues for business owners is that there is no Super Bowl, no World Series, and no Green Jacket.

There is no crowning event. . Sometimes family Businesses fail because the founder will not let go. The reasons they give are varied, but often include a reluctance to give up control, an unwillingness to see someone else in charge, the belief that no one could possibly take over, and a fear that if they give up control the company will inevitably fail, or that no one in the family is prepared to assume control.

A key piece of succession planning is the organizational process. Make no mistake ever organization needs talented people, successful family business have structure and processes. Structure and process create the comingling of ideas, talent and solutions. Family businesses need to be viable, successful to be passed down to future generations. One published description of succession planning states; Succession planning is a process for identifying and developing internal people with the potential to fill key business leadership positions in the company.

Succession planning increases the availability of experienced and capable employees that are prepared to assume these roles as they become available. Effective succession or talent management concerns itself with building a series of feeder groups up and down the entire leadership pipeline or progression. Succession planning in Family Business lets cooler heads prevail and engages the organization.