Reconciling Relationships and Preserving the Family Business

Learn how to keep family problems from affecting the family business! Reconciling Relationships and Preserving the Family Business: Tools for Success presents a comprehensive model for reconciling fractured relationships within the business-owning family. Studies show that more than two-thirds of family-owned businesses don't survive past the first generationand more than 90 percent of all business enterprises in the United States are owned by families. Written by the founders of the Carmel Institute for Family Business, this unique book is an essential tool for people involved in family businesses, where personal issues can mix with financial interdependencies and work grievances to cause professional failures independent of bad management, market conditions, or financial constraints. Reconciling Relationships and Preserving the Family Business is a practical and concise guide to building healthy families and collaborative family business teams that last for generations. The book introduces the ideology that frames the Reconciliation Model for relationship repair, and defines two main systemic problems facing business-owning families: oppression and disengagement. It also presents an in-depth study of a business-owning family, demonstrating how the Reconciliation Model worksstep-by-step. Reconciling Relationships and Preserving the Family Business addresses, including: - basic principles of relationships in business-owning families - individual dynamics that account for human dilemmas - power issues - effective intervention in troubled relationships - assessing relationship patterns - family structure and process - roles, responsibilities, and ethics of advisors working with family-owned businesses - and much more! Reconciling Relationships and Preserving the Family Business is a vital resource for members of business-owning families and for the professional people who advise them: lawyers, therapists, bankers, clinical social workers, accountants, consultants, and therapists. The book is invaluable for teaching you to recognize real or potential relational problems that can have an adverse effect on the family business.

- Foreword - Acknowledgments - Introduction - Part I. Relationships in Business-Owning Families - Chapter 1. The Past and Present Merge - The Past: Individual Development - Relationships: Making the Past Present - Choosing to Change - Ideology Underlying the Reconciliation Approach - Aiming for Reconciliation - Chapter 2. Family and Family Business Systems - Why Consider a Systems Perspective? - Understanding Systems: A Practical Approach - Context - Family Structure - Family Process - Unspoken Issues in Family Systems: Emotion and Normality - Gathering Initial Information - Systems Thinking: A Review of Principles - Chapter 3. Oppression in Business-Owning Families - Oppressive Systems - The Main Roles in Systems of Oppression - The Impact of Oppression on Family Business - Change Is Possible - Challenging Oppression - Chapter 4. Disengaged Families - The Importance of Cohesion in Families - Fractured or Severed Family Connections - Unconnected Business-Owning Families - Recognizing Disengagement - The Prospect of Reconciliation - Part II. The Reconciliation Model in Practice - Chapter 5. A Reconciliation Model Overview - Why Family Business Relationships Need Repair - The Model's Origins - Profiling the Model - Applying the Model - Guiding Principals for Advisors - Conclusion - Interlude 1: Meet the Sampsons, a Business-Owning Family - First Contacts - Compilation of Initial family Information - Getting an Agreement to Proceed - Chapter 6. Stage I: Recognize - About the Truth - Task #1: Make Contact - Task #2: Seek Relationship Truth - Task #3: Create Common Understanding - Task #4: Determine Who Participates - Task #5: Understand Change and Overcome Resistance - Task #6: Form Contracts - Task #7: Prepare Family Members for Participation in Reconciliation Efforts - Interlude 2: Setting the Stage for Reconciliation - Arranging Interviews with Sampson Family Members - Meeting with Local Family Members - Meeting with David Sampson and His Family - Chapter 7. Stage II: Reconsider - Tool #1: Provide a Safe Place - Tool #2: Establish Ground Rules - Tool #3: Provide Continuous Support - Tool #4: Acknowledge Peoples Memories - Tool #5: Teach People to Listento Learn and Understand - Tool #6: Orchestrate Responsive and Respectful Dialogue - Tool #7: Help Participants Apologize and Move Toward Forgiveness - Tool #8: Consider the Future - Interlude 3: The Heart of the Work - Arrival - Day One: Morning - Day One: Afternoon - Day Two: Morning - Day Two: Afternoon - Day Three: Morning - Day Three: Afternoon - Day Four: Morning - Day Four: Afternoon - Chapter 8. Stage III: Rebuild - Goal #1: Build and Preserve Trust - Goal #2: Foster Collaboration - Goal #3: Establish Reconciliation Practices - Goal #4: Grow Healthy-Interacting Families - Moving On - Interlude 4: Moving into the Future - Building Trust and Collaboration: Benton - Finishing with the Family - Sampson Seed Company: An Epilogue - Chapter 9. Being the Best We Can Be - Who is the Client? - What About Confidentiality? - Maintaining NeutralityIs It Possible? - The Team Approach to Advising - Saying Good-bye and Moving On - Conclusion - References - Index