More at Stake: The Family Business Podcast

In this episode, Keith Michaelson and Don Opatrny of The Lovins Group introduce and discuss the first of six key challenges that couples face when they are part of a family business: managing boundaries. Don and Keith walk us through why boundaries can be challenging for couples in the context of family business, the kinds of boundary conflicts that can occur—what they look like, how they can feel—and then offer some ideas and tools that can help couples begin to manage their boundary challenges. You can find all of our articles, interviews and resources at www.EngagedOwnership.com.  

Don Opatrny and Keith Michaelson of the Lovins Group join The Family Business Podcast to discuss the role of family meetings in family enterprises and offer some practical ideas for improving your family’s family meetings. Family meetings play an important role in family business governance. They are an opportunity to grow the capacity of the family to meet challenges together, as a family, and create space to succeed in what the Don and Keith refer to as, “the task of family.” We will explore ways of creating effective family meetings; how family meetings fit into overall governance; and how effective family meetings can make all other meetings attended by family members, including ownership and management meetings, go more smoothly.

In this episode, David Worth sat down with Engaged Ownership associate, Nathaniel Squires, to discuss how his family’s enterprise, Worth Industries, has turned a simple strategic concept into a robust form of Enterprise Capital. David is Chair and former CEO of Worth Industries, and Executive Director and our colleague at The Family Enterprise Center of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. New to the podcast? Be sure to check out our last episode, “5 Steps to Enterprise Capital” for a primer on the subject of Enterprise Capital and how it can become a driving force for innovation and resilience in your family business.

Human Capital is essential to a family business. But Human Capital can also be fragile. How do you ensure that the essential know-how that makes your business uniquely successful gets carried on? How do you scale your competitive advantage? How do you protect your most important capital? You make it into Enterprise Capital. What is Enterprise Capital? Enterprise Capital is all the unique know-how embodied within a business that allows a product to be made or a service to be delivered better than the competition can do it. It is the coming together of Human and Financial Capital to solve a problem. Enterprise Capital can take almost any form: machines, systems, know-how, algorithms, techniques, patents, processes. The key is to identify your most important capital and then institutionalize it; transform it from an individual unit of capital to capital that can be replicated, redeployed, and repurposed to strengthen competitive advantage and to create new opportunities. In this episode, you will learn a 5-step process for transforming your most important capital into Enterprise Capital.

Trust | Listen | Respect In this episode, Executive Leadership Coach Jane Sommers-Kelly speaks on her three-element approach to improving collaboration and tapping into Human Capital in teams and businesses: Trust, Listen, and Respect. You and your team can use this deceptively simple concept to tackle big questions, leverage untapped Human Capital, foster collaboration, and find solutions when solutions are hard to come by. Listen in to learn more. You can learn more about Jane's work at www.JSKLeadership.com. You can find all our articles, interviews, and resources on www.EngagedOwnership.com.

Don Opatrny and Keith Michaelson of the Lovins Group join The Family Business Podcast to talk about how COVID-19 is presenting new and difficult ways guilt can manifest itself in our lives. In this interview, Keith and Don share how family business leaders are coping when feeling overwhelmed and guilty from challenges they face or decisions they may have to make. Listen in to learn more about how you might deal with these challenges. The Lovins Group works with enterprising families to maintain healthy relationships and minimize risks as they move through generational transitions. The Lovins Group helps these families to formulate a shared purpose and design structures and processes for organization and governance that support progress toward their goals. www.EngagedOwnership.com www.LovinsGroup.com www.RenkertThomasConsulting.com

Around the world, family businesses are reacting and adapting to the challenges presented by COVID-19. In our work at Engaged Ownership and Renkert Thomas Consulting, we have found enterprising families to be uniquely adept at navigating such crises. How do they do it? By finding new ways to tap into their Human Capital. Listen in to learn more about how you can tap into your Human Capital and hear some examples of how businesses are utilizing Human Capital to address their changing needs, constraints, and opportunities. More resources can be found on www.EngagedOwnership.com.

Engaged Ownership Part IV discusses three situations that present challenges to developing engaged ownership: when the enterprise has both managing and non-managing owners, when a trustee is also an owner, and when outside investors are owners. Each of these circumstances presents unique challenges to a group of family business owners. Part IV of Engaged Ownership provides strategies for overcoming these challenges.

Practicing Engaged Ownership Part III explains how family business owners do the work of practicing engaged ownership and foster and maintain engagement. Chapter 11 spells out the reasons for and benefits from developing forums in which to make decisions. Family business forums include the Owners Council, Board of Directors, Family Assembly, and Beneficiary Council, and each has unique roles and responsibilities. An essential part of developing forums is establishing a clear allocation of decision-making power among stakeholders—owners management, board, and family—so that decision-making is transparent and effective. Another essential element of improving decision-making is improving meetings. Meetings are the vehicles of decision-making and there are real skills and practices to running effective meetings. Part III also explains policies—conditions that indicate a policy would be appropriate, common policies that are common for family businesses, and how policies relate to decision-making in the long term.

Part II: Getting Organized Part II of Engaged Ownership provides a foundation for family business owners seeking to increase engagement. You will learn about the complex relationships among owners, board of directors, management, and family, and how those wearing multiple “hats” can better navigate their responsibilities. You will also learn how family history, legacy, and natural governance affect the culture and environment within the family business system. Perhaps most importantly, Part II teaches the importance of a family’s Core Capital—human capital and enterprise capital, in addition to financial capital—and how it can be put to use both inside and outside the business. With an understanding of Core Capital, listeners will learn how to develop a Shared Purpose, Vision & Mission for their enterprise. Shared Purpose is the glue that binds stakeholders together, and Vision and Mission become the animating drivers for decision making and long-range planning.  

The Concept of Intention Ken McCracken joins More at Stake: The Family Business Podcast to discuss the concept of Intention in family business ownership. Intention shapes the way a family interacts with its enterprise and has significant impact on how the family business system operates as a whole.  Listen in to learn about this fascinating—and often overlooked—aspect of family businesses. Want to learn more? Ken wrote a two-part article on Intention for our digital family business magazine, www.EngagedOwnership.com. Ken McCracken is an internationally-renowned family business consultant. Ken is the author and teacher of the Advanced Certificate in Advising the Family Business for the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners (STEP). He is also a member of the Advisory Board of the Institute for Family Business. Ken is a Fellow of the Family Firm Institute (FFI) and a past recipient of their Award for Outstanding Interdisciplinary Achievement.

Welcome to the Engaged Ownership: A Guide for Owners of Family Businesses audiobook. To purchase a hardcover copy of Engaged Ownership—and receive a complementary Engagement Toolkit Map Book—visit the store on our digital family business magazine, MoreAtStake.com. Part I | Engaged Ownership: An Introduction Part I introduces the concept of engaged ownership—a different paradigm for family business owners and advisors. Engaged owners bring a deep understanding of their core capital and vision for the future. Advisors who understand the concepts and process of engaged ownership are better equipped to work effectively with their family business clients.  

Where does conflict come from? How can it be managed? Listen in as Amelia and Blair Trippe discuss Blair and Doug Baumoel’s exceptional book, Deconstructing Conflict: Understanding Family Business, Shared Wealth and Power. Based around the “Conflict Equation,” Deconstructing Conflict gets to the heart of conflict in family enterprises, and how it can be identified and managed.