The challenge of working in a family business

David Bentall is based in Vancouver and has really has two careers. The first was following his father and grandfather into the family real estate and construction businesses where he rose to be the President of Commercial Construction. However, as can happen with family businesses, things went sour when his father and two of his brothers fell out and the business was sold. Since then, David has become an author and consultant, using his to help other families to get a better result.

Family businesses are the backbone of the global economy. One of the biggest challenges they face is the relationship between different aspects of the business, the corporate role/personal relationship or the owner/employee. David was only an 8% owner of the family business but he wanted to put his ownership hat on all the time. On reflection, he realises that he needed to learn to use his employee hat more often. There is also the relationship between the founders of the business, the 2nd generation who drive things forward and then the 3rd generation where often things start to go wrong. There is a lot of background evidence around the ideas of succession and moving the business forward. Bringing new ideas on board can be difficult because of the power dynamics in a family business.

One of the critical dynamics of a family business is to manage relationships. Before you manage businesses, you have to manage yourself. David is very interested in the role of Emotional Intelligence as a catalyst for better relationships. He thinks that if he had been more patient it would have made a difference in his relationship with his family. He thought being impatient was a virtue, he was a young, driving executive who wanted to make things happen but making things happen destroyed his relationship with his uncle. The two characteristics David thinks would have made a difference are more patience and more humility.

Many people come into a family business as part of the succession plan and never work anywhere else. David feels they need work outside of the family business to gain some perspective. He worked for two years for an outside company and found there were many advantages but the main one was to develop credibility with both non-family employees and with other family members.

Working with an outside company helps develop different skills such as dealing with people.  You might not like other members of your family but they might be good at driving the business forward.  Skills need to be developed and it’s good to get genuine feedback from other people about your performance. At one point David had a mentor who would ask all eleven of the vice presidents working for David what things he had done badly recently.  He would then back and they would sort it out – in other words he got the real world thrown in his face twice a year!

The role of ego is also important. David played sport at college so he learned how important it was to be self-confident as an athlete but right beside this is pride. When he was brought into the family company he had a very inflated view of himself and this was further fuelled by his father who wanted him to become president. He could see no wrong in David and as he was the largest shareholder and president of the board it allowed David’s confidence in himself to undermine his willingness to admit he didn't know everything. Arrogance and pride can be an enormous problem and he thought he had all the answers.

There is a balance to be had between confidence and assuredness and arrogance and obstinacy. Sometimes wisdom brings that to the point of fruition. Wisdom comes from making mistakes - you can be wise and 20 or 60 and not wise at all. In his 40s David took up competitive water skiing and he was often nervous before an event. He told his coach that he wanted to be more self confident but the coach said that wasn’t the case, what was needed was to be confident in the process. There is a difference between focusing on doing the right things and thinking you are always right.

In some family businesses things are left to chance, things are not written down, not made clear about how things are set up and meant to work. There is an implied trust that everyone is working together but this is a dangerous assumption to build a company on. Family members are not always loyal and can decide not to work together. They don't always get on well and one person can turn against the rest of the family is they feel there is something to gain. Family bonds are more personal and can be more vicious. 

You can find out more about David at nextstepadvisors.ca David is also an author and his book, Dear Younger Me: Wisdom for Family Enterprise Successors explores the character traits critical for navigating the interpersonal demands of a family business enterprise.

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