During the height of the pandemic, we conducted some research to understand how business families were reacting to the pressures caused by some of the drastic changes in market conditions. While the full analysis of that research is not complete, one statistic stood out to us as being particularly interesting. In an effort to better understand how business families were using entrepreneurship as a tool to address pandemic related changes, we asked family business leaders what percent of their current sales were coming from innovations they had made since the pandemic began. The data was collected in the summer of 2020, less than 6 months after the World Health Organization officially declared Covid-19 a pandemic.
Sustaining an Entrepreneurial Spirit in Your Family Business
Innovation tends to decline from one generation to the next. But it doesn’t have to.
September 23, 2022
Skizzomat Illustration
Summary.
The idea of generational decline in family businesses is nothing new. The old adage “shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations” seems to exist in one form or another in many cultures and languages. The common assumption is that the decline is driven by a generation gap of sorts, where successive generations become less motivated, and less capable of leading the business. But a decline in the entrepreneurial activity of a family business across generations is not inevitable. Rather than focus on significant issues (gaps) between generations, families should focus on correcting misalignments in expectations and needs. An emphasis on increasing the entrepreneurial ability of the next generation combined with efforts to provide opportunities for the next generation to act entrepreneurially will increase the willingness of the next generation to take action. There are many differences between each consecutive generation, but an entrepreneurial spirit does not need to be one of them.