Let's move now to the third system: the managers–stewards, or those who manage on behalf of the owners–stewards. In the owners–stewards system, my suggestion was that you draw a continuum bounded at one end with a heart and the other a dollar sign, or labeled “financial” and “psychological.” In the family–stewards circle I encouraged you to draw smaller family units within the larger family system. In the manager–stewards circle I suggest the addition of a series of bullet points. This will enable a list of what it is that manager–stewards must manage. The list will include, for example, the operating business (sometimes called the legacy business), real estate holdings, liquid assets, philanthropic activities, joint ventures, and the like. The older and more established the business, the more bullet points that are likely to be included in this system. As with the other two systems, this modification adds a level of detail that helps you understand and appreciate how this simple framework can be used to tell such a complex story.
And that is the key message for all of these frameworks: they are a simple way to tell complex stories.
So, in front of you now should be three circles with edited labels and continuums, circles, and bullet points. The next step is to form the circles into dyads, to look at the framework in yet another way. But there is no need to draw a revised set of circles. Rather, just focus on one pairing of circles at a time. First, consider the overlap between the owners and managers. The argument here, and a key component of the approach we will use to build the Continuity Canvas in Part II, is that there is tension, or the potential for tension, between the managers–stewards and the owners–stewards. Recall that the managers–stewards manage on behalf of the owners–stewards. What is required to reduce the potential for conflict or tension is a strategic plan to ensure alignment between these two groups. As will be shown in Part II, this is one of four essential plans that make up the Continuity Canvas. We use the same approach, not surprisingly, at the intersection of the owners–stewards and family–stewards systems. In this dyad, we address the potential for tension through development of an asset, wealth, and estate plan. Moving to the overlap between the family–stewards and the managers–stewards system, to address the potential for tension between these two systems requires a successors’ talent development plan. Finally, at the center of the three systems, where the three circles overlap, there is again potential for tension. To reduce this tension, or its potential, and increase the likelihood of continuity, the Continuity Model Generation commits to the development and implementation of a governance plan.
Illustration 7 FULLY DEVELOPED THREE CIRCLES FRAMEWORK
As stated earlier, the simplicity of the three circles framework masks its richness. While previous generations have acknowledged that the paradigm is useful in distinguishing what is unique to business-owning families, the Continuity Model Generation extends a level of sophistication to this framework, as suggested in the sections above (Illustration 7).
Upon adding the three circles framework to the four foundational theories (agency, stewardship, resource-based view, and principal cost) as well as to the complementary logics (economic and social) approach, it is apparent why this meta-framework is the keystone in the arch of continuity modeling. Feel free to reread this section and add your voice.
Familial Meta-Framework
While there is a familial component to everything for the Continuity Model Generation, the four frameworks within the familial meta-framework make difficult conversations much easier.
The Big Tent Framework
As businesses and families evolve, promoting meaningful involvement and engagement among enterprise members presents a challenge. As one sage family business leader suggests, “entitlement and wealth become the enemy.”
Most families that have effectively addressed the challenge of engagement pursue a big tent approach. It's the idea that family leaders prefer to have the growing number of family members inside the tent, where they are provided appropriate education and other development support for meaningful roles, rather than outside the tent, where they may become suspicious of what's going on inside and even tempted to sabotage it, whether intentionally or not. Thus, a big tent approach sends a strong message, particularly to next-generation members and affines, about their potential value and contributions to the enterprise, and the importance of their involvement (Illustration 8).
But the approach requires careful, strategic orchestration.
Indeed, with an increasing number of families worldwide committed to family governance initiatives, they are in effect developing their own, idiosyncratic big tent approaches. Specifically, they are setting clear guidelines for how family members can engage meaningfully with, and contribute to, the family and its ever more complex and challenging business activities.
In lectures and presentations, when I share my observations of families who pursue the big tent approach, the metaphorical concept usually makes intuitive sense to listeners, no matter the country or audience type. But it's only when I describe what it feels like to be left out of the tent that the message really hits home.
The main example I share is when members of a founding generation explained to me that they wanted their legacy to be a family enterprise that survived across many generations. Immediately after, they stipulated that the wives of their two sons were to be excluded from all business conversations. In response, they were delicately reminded that the spouses were the mothers of their grandchildren, and therefore significant influences on how the third generation would see the business, and thus it may have made sense to “bring them into the tent”; they reconsidered and committed to establish meaningful non-operational roles for their daughters-in-law. Other, similar examples, such as those of affines who are excluded from “family” meetings, also tend to hit home.
Still, inclusion of family members for the sake of inclusion can be interpreted as a token gesture. The key, then, from my observations of insightful multigenerational family businesses, is to ensure that individuals are ready, willing, and capable to contribute in a meaningful way. I must emphasize the tripartite nature of this set of attributes, as implied by the use of the word “and” rather than “or.” That is, the omission of any one of the three qualities—such as being ready and willing but not capable—means potential disaster, or at the very least a far from ideal situation for the family and enterprise. Readiness, willingness, and capability are mandatory qualities for contribution.
This discussion also raises the question of what it means to contribute to the enterprise. Again, observation of families who spend a considerable amount of time getting this right suggests that an ideal way to promote contribution is to design meaningful pathways to contribute. There's no one right set of such pathways, but there are many examples of these types of pathways:
Executive
Manager/supervisor
Enterprise/entrepreneurship
Family office
Family governance
Business governance
Family philanthropy
Each of the pathway-related roles comes with a distinct set of requirements, responsibilities, and remuneration, all of which must be clearly articulated. See again my earlier caveat that all elements of the big tent approach require