One of the often unspoken tensions in family businesses is the reality that multiple owners and future owners may not all want to participate in the same way. But too often those needs and expectations are not discussed or standardized. The authors describe five types of family business owners whose involvement ranges from passive to operational. He also shares a process to help families discuss their desired roles and develop business governance accordingly.
Sienna Amouri*, the 72-year-old president and founder of a luxury cosmetics company, was distraught. A true self-employed person in the classic sense, Sienna was intimately familiar with the day-to-day details of her extensive business empire, even watching her eldest sons, Remo and Robert, storm out in tears from their monthly half-day business meetings. It was their younger sister, Quinn, the current CEO, who was both shocked and angry and trying to comfort her mother. She wondered how her previously close family had gotten to this point.