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5 Things you Need to Know: Family Inheritance

Family Inheritance

While few people actually relish thinking about the details of the inheritance they will leave their family when they die, most do spend at least some time wondering how to make sure that things will go well among their heirs.

We’ve all heard of families where relationships were harmed, sometimes beyond repair, as the result of how this important question was dealt with. If you do not want to be one of THOSE families, please read on.

Also note that these are five things everyone should know and understand, but that doesn’t make them an exhaustive list of important considerations, or even a “top 5 list” for every family situation. This blog should never substitute for legal advice for your unique family situation.

 

  1. Big or Small, the same issues arise

You don’t have to have a net worth in the gazillions to be affected by the potential negative fallout from poor decisions in this area.

Siblings have been known to never speak to each other again as the result of parental decisions that were made that surprised everyone, even in cases where the inheritance barely covered the cost of the funeral.

Rule 1: Don’t assume that there isn’t enough to worry about

 

  1. A WILL is Key

It should go without saying that every adult needs a will. Unfortunately, statistics show that many do not.

Many people who don’t likely assume that they have plenty of time to take care of it, you know, “later”. There are cemetaries full of people who guessed wrong on the question of exactly when they were going to die.

You need a will, and it really should be current. A good rule of thumb is to review it every five years.

Rule 2: Make sure you have a legal will, no excuses!

 

  1. A Will is NOT Enough

Now if you have your will in place and are thinking you are in the clear, well, sorry, we still have (at least) 3 more items here!

You have decided to leave certain assets to certain people in a certain way, and it’s all written up legally in a will. Here is the important question: do the people who will inherit your assets KNOW what they will be inheriting?

At least some form of basic communication is absolutely essential. If you haven’t already done so, please make sure that everyone understands what is going to happen. If you can let them all know together, at the same time, even better.

Letting them assume, and having different people understand different versions of it is a sure recipe for trouble.

Rule 3: Your heirs should know what is coming

 

  1. “Pre-Mediation” Can Make Sense

When a dispute goes into mediation, parties are brought together, and along with a neutral third party, they examine everyone’s interests and work towards a satisfactory conclusion.

The idea of pre-mediating is to put the scenario on the table with the parties before it actually comes into play.

The main point is that if you leave things to your heirs in the way you planned, AND that will cause problems after you are gone, why would you not want to re-adjust while you still can?

If this idea scares you, then that is a sign that yours is actually precisely the kind of situation that could most benefit from this.

Rule 4: Play out the details while you still can

 

5 “Surprise” is NOT a Good Thing 

I have heard Tom Deans (author of Willing Wisdom) speak several times. He describes the sound that many lawyers tell him they’ve heard from at least one surprised heir at the reading of many a will.

It is difficult to convey in writing, but imagine a gasp with an audible “aaargh” or “euhhhh”.

That surprised sound from any of your heirs is NOT what you should be going for.

Rule 5: Let your family grieve and celebrate your life, not shake their heads in disbelief.

 

If you know someone who should be thinking about these questions but may have been avoiding them, please feel free to forward this to them. You will both be glad you did.

 

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It’s All about Getting Started

The start icon. Start symbol. Flat Vector illustration

Most of us usually have a pretty good idea of “what to do” in situations, and we think about our motivations to clarify the “why” as well. Today’s post is going to look at the “how and when”, and getting started on the important steps in generational transitions.

Timing can so often be crucial in life; how often have you either just been “in the right place at the right time”, or just missed an opportunity because an open door suddenly shut? Of course there are also occasions when we are too early as well.

For every “early bird” who gets the worm, there is a “second mouse” that gets the cheese. My bias is to move early, and I know that if anyone could ever convince me to try parachuting, I would likely pull the cord too early rather than too late.

In a business family, there is often a desire to have the hard work of a generation carry on into the next, and hopefully to subsequent generations as well.

One of my favourite expressions is “things don’t just happen by themselves”, and maybe that’s because working with these types of families has underscored the importance of taking action.

Inter-generational transitions are complex matters. The more people involved and the larger the asset base in question, the trickier things get. The more complex things are, the longer it will take to get things right.

So the “what” in this case is preparing the inter-generational transition, the “why” is because we want our hard work to benefit future generations of our family, and the “when” is, well, whenever I get around to it (!?).

Hopefully you caught the problem in the previous sentence.

As mentioned above, my bias is that it’s better to start too soon than too late. Complexity can slow things down more than you can ever imagine, and when important questions come up, and they always do, more time to get things right is very helpful.

When is the right time to start?

Sometimes you just know, and sometimes you need a push. Divine inspiration is not always forthcoming.

The two main generations, let’s call them NowGen and NextGen, don’t always see eye to eye on the timing.

In many cases the NextGen pushes for action but is met with resistance by the NowGen, but it can also be some variation of the reverse situation. Sometimes the NowGen is met with disinterest from the rising generation.

The biggest causes of delaying action on these key matters are: fear of conflict, fear of mortality, not knowing how to begin, not having anyone in charge of the process, and being too busy with more urgent matters.

Fear of Conflict

“We can’t talk about that, because it will cause a rift”. If that is your case, are you assuming that the underlying issue will just go away, or that the kids will figure it out after you’re gone?

Better to talk about it and smooth over any potential conflict while we can still modify whatever we have planned and explain all decisions. If you suspect conflict, getting out in front of it is better than the ostrich approach.

Mortality

Talking about sex never got anyone pregnant, and talking about money never made anyone rich, so talking about your eventual death is not going to kill you either.

Get over it. If you are equating your exit from certain roles in your business with your death, that is another issue, and there are ways to deal with that too.

How/Where to Begin

Start talking about the subject and ask questions of other family members to get their ideas about what the future might look like when the next generation is in charge. Listen, and then ask more questions, and listen some more.

Who’s in Charge?

If you are reading this and liking what you see, then please go and take charge of the process. Then bring someone in from the outside who will help keep you on track.

Too Busy Putting Out Fires

Not everything that seems “urgent” is that important. Prioritize, delegate. Learn to work on what is truly important to the big picture.

You probably should have started a while ago, so get moving already.

 

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Harnessing the NextGen in the FamBiz

 

Twin sisters riding horses in the sunset by the sea on the island of Ada Bojana, Montenegro

While attending the annual conference of the Family Firm Institute in Miami, one of of the breakout sessions contained a kind of A-Ha moment for me.

It was not a “knock your socks off” A-Ha, but enough to stimulate a blog post, which may not be a very high hurdle, considering I write one of these posts every week. Alas, it contained a “juicy tidbit” that struck me as worth pursuing here.

Now an FFI conference will always feature several well-known family business experts sharing their thoughts, but my little A-Ha occurred during a session where the presenter was relatively unknown, as he was not a FamBiz guy, but a branding expert.

It was Paul Bay, an L.A. Dodgers fan from London (!), which I learned at the opening cocktail the evening before his presentation. His typical get-up includes a three-piece suit and a pair of sneakers. I guess that’s part of his brand, and it was working for him.

 

A Branding A-Ha?

If you’re hoping my A-Ha had to do with branding, you’ll be disappointed, because that wasn’t it. It was all about the harness. The harness? Well actually, the verb, “(to) harness”.

As I write this, I am trying to recall how the slide with the word “harness” at the top actually fit into his branding talk, and I am at a loss. I did, however, take a picture of the slide in response to my internal A-Ha.

Down the left side of the Powerpoint slide were the words “Guide, Direct, Govern, Constrain, Control, Hold Back”.

On the right-hand side were “Involve, Collaborate, Gain, Be Guided, Be Inspired, Be Directed”.

This was the first time that I ever thought about the fact that there are two sides to the harness coin. (Insert “A-Ha” here)

 

Harnessing in the FamBiz

When you think about the “NextGen” in a family business, the way the family looks at what they are harnessing, and why they are trying to harness it, you can easily see that it can go both ways. How they harness it becomes key.

The positive side of harnessing, “involving, collaborating, gaining, etc.” looks at ways that the family can take the talents and inputs of the rising generation and put them to positive use, to grow the family capital and the strengths of the business.

On the other end of the spectrum, “constrain, control, hold back, etc.” you have a host of actions that unfortunately also occur in too many family businesses.

 

Wild Horses on my Mind

So I began thinking about wild horses and what it must have been like when the first brave souls came upon them and were motivated to try to harness them.

Horses, even wild ones, do not seem the type of animal that would need to be harnessed to dampen any negatives of their behaviour. I can only imagine that the power and strength they exhibited was seen as worth the trouble and danger of attempting to harness them in the first place.

So if you have a business family, and there is a rising generation that is coming of age, how are you looking at harnessing what they can bring to the table?

 

Horses with Potential and Passion

Some horses are easier to harness than others, and I can only imagine that those who are identified as having great potential will often be those for whom the time and effort are the most worthwhile.

Few of us have the skills of a Dr. Doolittle, to actually speak “horse” to find out just what a particular equine has a passion for (Math? 2 + 1 = Clop, clop, clop! Good girl, here’s a carrot.)

 

Questions and Conversations

Every parent actually speaks a language that their children understand, but not enough of them will take the time and make the effort to have the conversations (plural) necessary to ask the important questions, like:

  • Do you have a passion to contribute to the business?
  • Do you have a passion to contribute to the family?
  • What human capital do you already have, and what are you prepared to develop, to contribute?
  • Is there a “harness” that fits you so comfortably that you will feel happy and motivated to wear it proudly?

THEIR passion is the key to good harnessing.

 

 

 

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Thanksgiving and Who Needs Whom More

Happy Thanksgiving, Canada

Sometimes these blog posts are inspired by the time of year, and so on this Canadian Thanksgiving weekend I will share some thoughts on gratitude.

But a whole post on being thankful is really not my style, so I will also try to tie in another idea that has been ruminating in my head lately.

Last year at this time, I came across a post on Twitter, the contents of which I have shared verbally with a number of people. It was from David Chilton, author of the Wealthy Barber. (If you ever have an opportunity to hear him speak, do yourself a favour and go).

 

Spotlight on Gratitude

He posted something along the lines of “If you are healthy and you live in Canada, every day is Thanksgiving”. Amen to that.

Gratitude is a subject that entire books have been devoted to, and I know many people who need to be reminded of just how good we have it sometimes.

We can easily slip into complaint mode too often, with what could best be described as “first world problems”.

 

Process vs Content, Process vs Event

Last week I wrote about process versus content (FamBiz Conflict: Resolve it or Manage it?) but there is another comparison with process that people in the family business and legacy space like to talk about too, and that’s process versus event. (see Striving for a Succession Non-Event)

My challenge is now to try to tie this in to the Thanksgiving theme in the hopes of adding some coherence to this post. Here goes.

 

Who Needs Whom More?

When you were born, you needed your parents more than they needed you. As you reach the end of your days, you will very likely need your children more than they need you.

There are exceptions of course, but please bear with me here. Life IS a journey, or a process, if you will. Somewhere along the way in life, the answer to the question “Who Needs Whom More” flips.

Your children need you more when they are young, you need your children more when you are old. But when does it flip? And does it “flip” quickly like a coin, or slowly, like turning around the proverbial oceanliner?

I daresay that it is much more of a process than an event.

 

You Reap what You Sow

When we were kids, my sisters and I were thankful for our parents, although I am not certain that we expressed it frequently enough. As they grew older, and we matured, I know that they became more thankful for us.

Ideally, gratitude is something that we learn from our parents, and then teach our children. Parenting, manners, how to behave, how we do things in our family; all are part of the legacy and heritage we pass along to following generations.

As any farmer will tell you, as you sow, so shall you reap.

 

Values versus Valuables

Family wealth succession can be very complex and involve lots of detailed transactions and documents concerning the family’s valuables.

But your true family legacy depends much more on passing on the values of your family.

I hope that gratitude is one of the values that my children have picked up from their parents, I know that I got most of my values from mine.

My kids are teenagers now, but I have been treating them as much as possible as if they are adults for a while now.

Trying not to tell them what to do, trying to make sure that “you’re not the boss of me” is not something that even remotely enters their minds.

 

Equals versus “One Up, One Down”

Am I doing this because I realize that someday I will need them more than they need me? Perhaps, subconsciously.

My point is that the longer it takes to turn around the answer to the “Who Needs Whom More” question, the better.

A relationship of equals, adult to adult, with nobody in the “one up” position, and nobody “one down” either.

 

It really never is “Too Late”

It’s never too late to try to make things better, and the outreach can come from either side.

This week I was reminded about the old saying that “the people you meet on the way up are the same ones you will meet on the way down”. I think it applies here too.

Please remember that, you will be thankful that you did.

 

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My Baby, My Heir

There is something about reflecting on the past and dreaming about the future that can get us excited. When we specifically involve our family members in these thoughts, it can be even more remarkable.

Now if only we could make sure that the past memories and future dreams were all positive!

We start worrying about our offspring before they’re born, and sometimes even before they’re conceived. But for simplicity’s sake, let’s say it all starts at birth.

We also worry about what will happen to them after we’re gone. Of course after we’ve passed away, there isn’t really much we can do about anything anymore.

For practical purposes, the moment a baby is born, they become a future heir, and upon the death of a parent, they become the true heir.

During the time when a parent and child are both alive, there are many stages that they go through as they move from “baby” to “heir”.

 

Not All Distinctions Are Clear

Unlike birth dates and death dates, the movement from one stage to the next is usually less clear. Let’s look at some examples.

When does one move from “baby” to toddler, to pre-schooler? Do these stages always last as long as we hoped, or are they too long, or too brief? Do the child and parent agree on when they moved from one stage to the next?

Some of the periods are quite clear, “high school student”, for example, or undergraduate in college, with specific start and end dates.

There are overarching periods too, like “dependent”, and that one can become a bit ambiguous too. Parents usually say they want their offspring to become independent, but sometimes their actions make it look like they’re unsure how to go about that.

If the family owns a business, there’s a whole new set of stages, like part-time employee, summer intern, full-time employee, whether starting in the mailroom, or otherwise.

Then there are other business roles, like manager, VP, leader, board member, owner, CFO, CEO. Some of the distinctions are clear, some overlap, some do not apply, and a whole bunch of others can be added too.

 

Business Roles, Family Roles

Outside the company there are even more important roles, even if they do not come with a business card and title.

We don’t like to think about the time when there will be a role reversal, and the child will become the caretaker, and the parent will be the dependent. It is, however a reality that most of us will face. And it might be sooner than we expect.

There is a natural progression to all of this, but it isn’t always smooth, and in fact it can be quite “lumpy”, not to mention bumpy.

If you are concerned about your multi-generation legacy, as I believe you should be, it makes sense for both generations to be on the same page, but often they are not.

I have done some gross over-simplification here as we have gone along, only looking at a one child, one parent scenario.

Yes, I know that things are usually even more complex, involving two parents, and multiple children. My point is that even the one-parent-one-child situation is rarely simple.

I thought about calling this post “From Baby to Heir, and Everything in Between”, but shortened it. I want to highlight that there is a fixed period of time, while both generations are alive, where you can both truly work on the relationship.

 

Natural Order of Things

The relationship will NATURALLY change, from dependent to caretaker, from child to former child. I like the word “offspring”, as it covers both, and hopefully gets the parents to stop thinking of adults in their 30’s, 40’s and 50’s as “kids”.

The parent goes from leader, in the “one up” position, through a period of “equal” adults, and then finally to dependent, or “one down”.

Not thinking about this doesn’t change it, it only delays your doing what needs to be done.

Are there some relationships in your family that are still stuck in a framework that is no longer suitable, and is unsustainable?

What are you going to do about it? These conversations need to happen, however difficult they are to get started.

 

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So Maybe it IS the Highway

Highway traffic in sunset, travel concept background

“It’s MY way, or the Highway”

That expression is familiar to most people, and if you have ever been around an old-fashioned founder of a family business, it may hit especially close to home.

It’s interesting to note that as recently as a few decades ago, the default reaction to someone making this exclamation has probably changed.

What I mean by that is that in the middle of the last century, a family business leader who demanded that everything be done their way would more often than not succeed in getting everyone to do as they pleased.

In the early decades of this century, however, I would venture to guess that more often than not, they will have difficulty in getting everyone to buy into the “MY way”. So much so that fewer people will even dare utter that phrase.

So what has changed? Well there are a whole bunch of societal changes that have been occurring over the past few decades and it is important to be aware of how they are affecting business families.

 

Two Kinds of Life Expectancy

People are living longer, and staying productive and healthy for many more years than in the past, and the typical business founder has some difficulty letting go. Decades ago, their offspring could join the family business with the expectation that they would get to a point where they would inherit the business while still young enough to get to do things their own way. Not so much today.

The other kind of life expectancy is a term that I coined here myself, just for this blog. When invited to join the family business, more and more Next Generation members are thinking hard about what they expect out of their life.

 

Education = Options

Many families who have successful businesses will encourage their children to get a great education, but while they are getting educated, they are also getting exposed to the world of opportunities that such an education affords them.

What often happens is that a number of great options become hard to resist. If the choice is to return to the family fold and fall in line with a parent’s, “My Way”, or to go out and forge your own path, well, at least one of those paths is usually more tempting.

It can be understandably disappointing for parents to discover that a business that they built “for the family” does not seem to have any interested “takers”.

Families with means encourage independence in their offspring, and then lament the fact that they are no longer able to interest their children in being involved and taking over.

 

No Magic Bullet

At the risk of disappointing readers expecting me to provide a magic bullet solution, “sorry”. But I will offer some words of advice just the same.

It is true that there are more and more good “highways” out there, and if your “former chidren” have found a career for which they have a passion, then that’s probably better than having them come work for you and hate Mondays.

Also, if you have built a sustainable company and do not have any heirs who want to work there, all is not lost. Have you thought about having the family continue to own the business, even after you retire, having it run by professional, non-related management?

If you want to be involved with your children and they have an entrepreneurial spirit that they inherited from their parents but they are not exactly enthralled by your business, have you thought about helping them get started in a business venture in a field that they are passionalte about?

These last two ideas, long term family ownership of the business and starting a new business with and for your kids, are just a couple of ways to avoid the old question of My Way OR the highway.

 

The Family > The Business

If you have an open mind, and some creativity, you can look for ways to do things “Our Way”, and try a few different highways.

When thinking about the next generation, I always encourage people to be a great parent first, and think about the business second. I hope you see the wisdom of that approach.

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Facts versus Opinions and Assumptions

Hand holding a Facts 3D Sphere sign on white background.

Opinions disguised as Facts

This week I was participating in a monthly online group meeting with colleagues who are all Bowen Family Systems Theory enthusiasts, and one of them made a statement that immediately struck me as “blog-worthy”.

She was talking about her family of origin (the one in which she grew up) and when referencing her father, she attributed the description “someone who stated a lot of opinions as though they were facts”. Wow, I thought, that sounds like my Dad!

This got me thinking about the characteristics that helped my father become successful, which included his “don’t take no for an answer” approach to life, his self-confidence, and his ability to size up a situation quickly and develop a plan of action.

When I think of what helped make him a great businessman, these are some of the attributes that made him who he was. Even though I am certain about them, that doesn’t mean that my assertions qualify as “facts”. They are, quite simply, my opinion.

I am less prone to act quickly, preferring to observe matters, take in various details of what I see and hear, and then take my time before deciding if any action is warranted. Perhaps it’s just my nature, or maybe part of it comes from the fact that I usually feel like I have the luxury of time to think.

Looking back at my Dad and his own upbringing and the circumstances under which he built his business, for the first 50-some years of his life, I doubt that he ever felt like he could afford to think about taking his time.

 

Important succession character traits

When business families start to look at the questions surrounding succession of their business and who should be involved, the ways that the different generations consider these issues start to come into play.

An entrepreneurial business founder who started a company, and against all odds built it into a sizeable organization, will likely have many of the traits that my father had, including an action-orientation that leaves little time to consider various opinions about important matters.

The character traits that will help ensure that the company and the family will continue to prosper into the next generation, however, are likely to be quite different.

If the number of people involved increases from one generation to the next, as it often does, then the ability to consider the opinions of all stakeholders will likely become a factor going forward.

Sometimes the hard-charging founder will have a child who is literally a “chip-off-the-old-block”, and they will usually be seen as the “heir apparent” early on, with the thinking that what was important for the business in one generation would continue to be key in the next.

The problems with that line of thinking include:

  • The skill sets involved in growing a business from the ground up, versus those of maintaining it, are sometimes quite different;
  • Technology changes over a few decades can be considerable;
  • The main group of concern may no longer be the company, but may well have shifted to the family.

 

Expert Opinions are still Opinions

There is no simple answer to these questions of course, but as an advisor to families who are faced with business and wealth transition situations, I can affirm that the most successful plans come after consultation with the stakeholders.

The leading generation often seeks the input of trusted advisors, all expert in their particular domain, like legal, tax, or accounting. These experts are also prone to offer up their opinions cleverly disguised as facts, which makes them seem incontrovertable.

When a family gets the experts involved before including the family, a plan is usually presented to the family after it has been made, as a “fait accompli” (note that “fait” is French for “fact”).

The opinions of those for whom the plan was made, usually the children, will not have been considered (at least not their true opinions). More likely the parents will have made assumptions about what was best for them, without asking.

When you look at how often “assumptions” and “opinions” get treated as “facts”, you can understand why so many family business transitions fail.

Stick to the facts.

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It’s NOT about the Money

No Money bag sign icon. Dollar USD currency symbol. Red prohibition sign. Stop symbol. Vector

 

In some ways, this blog has been a long time coming. It feels like an obvious topic for me, I am almost surprised at myself for not having addressed it yet.

I am not sure what triggered it now, but here goes, let’s see if I can turn this question into something useful and entertaining.

Money has a huge impact on all of us, and working with business families and those in the UHNW space (Ultra High Net Worth) it is obviously top of mind much of the time. But for people who have a lot of money, is money all that they talk about, think about, and worry about?

 

What else is there to talk about?

In my experience, those who have plenty of money prefer to talk about other subjects. Maybe it is because they don’t have to worry about where their proverbial next meal is going to come from, or maybe it is because they are tired of listening to all the financial experts in their lives, who seem to talk about little else.

I arrived at this calling of working with enterprising families after a couple of decades managing a small family office that was created after a liquidity event in my family when I was in my twenties.

I quickly learned that when you are managing your family’s wealth, it is much better to lay low, or else you will become a target for anyone and everyone peddling their wonderful solutions to problems you never knew you had.

I guess one of the reasons I am writing about this now is that I have noticed an uptick in the number of these financial solution peddlers hitting me up lately. You see, when I decided to enter the world of family advising, it made much less sense for me to lay low, and in fact I needed to do a 180 and try to make a splash.

The curious thing is that these peddlers are contacting me repeatedly now, and I find very little compelling in what the vast majority is offering. For everyone who claims to offer something unique, I could literally find five to ten others offering something quite similar within a few block radius in any major city.

Before I look at how you plan to take care of any money that I might allocate to you, I need to feel comfortable with you and learn one whole heckuva lot more about you, and your firm, AND know that you have taken at least a bit of time trying to understand ME and my family.

 

Do I need ANOTHER financial solution provider?

Most families don’t need another financial solutions provider. They are almost literally available on every street corner.

Families who own significant wealth will more likely need help figuring out how to treat all family members fairly, whether they grew their assets by 5% last year or by 10%.

They will more likely appreciate help in deciding how to think about, plan, and communicate their legacy decisions, as they imagine how the things that they have worked for all of their lives will play out as the wealth gets transitioned to the next generation.

Oh, and that NextGen group? Yeah, well they probably have lots of questions for their parents too, not they they feel comfortable asking them. What kind of questions?

You know, the ones about fairness, controlling their own destiny, having a clear understanding of all of the “dreams and plans” that their parents have for them and their wealth, but that have not been discussed or written down anywhere.

If bragging about how your fund beat the S&P by 2 percent last year is what you wanna sell, good luck with that.

 

That Pie is pretty big!

Once the family pie reaches a certain size, making it bigger ceases to be the focus. Figuring out how to enjoy it as a family together over generations takes over as a priority.

Families have a pretty good idea of what they want to do, and why they want to do it. They usually need help with the HOW. The how involves family dynamics, and that can be a scary subject.

Can you help a family with that? If not, you better find someone who can.

 

 

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What Are You Leaving Them?

1yWhat are you leaving your Family - Curling Game

Just about every parent gets to a point in their life where they cannot help but think about just what they will be leaving their children when they die.

Among the things that they think about are both the tangible, like money, property and other valuables, and the intangible, like life lessons, values, unforgettable life experiences and a true sense of their family legacy.

“What” is not the only question that comes up of course, there is also “why” and “how”. And let’s not forget the sub-parts of “what”, like “when”, “where”, and “who”, but they’re well beyond the scope of one blog post.

The “why” and the “how” are pretty important to work out, because they are so often the root cause of family conflict afterwards, when children are unclear as to why their parents arranged things as they did.

When I ask these questions of parents, the “what” is the easiest place to start, and I always begin with the tangible stuff. We are not ignoring the important intangible things, just delaying them until we get a better handle on stuff that everyone can see and agree on.

I’ve always been a sports fan, and maybe even a bigger fan of analogies, and plenty of sports analogies come to mind on the topic of “what you are leaving”.

In rugby, when a team scores a “try” (similar to a touchdown in football), they get to kick a convert for more points, but unlike in football, the spot of the kick depends on where the player downed the ball in the end zone.

So if a player scores a try near the sideline, he (or his teammate) needs to attempt a much more difficult convert than if he scored in the middle of the end zone.

Moral: The details of what you leave definitely affect others and their likelihood of success.

In hockey, the difference between a good goaltender and a great one is often their ability to control rebounds. A good goalie stops the puck, a great goalie will not only stop the puck, but also make sure that it ends up in a location that makes it more difficult for the opposition to score on the rebound.

Moral: It is important to think not only about what you leave your loved ones, but also what you do NOT leave to others.

In billiards, a good player will sink the ball in the pocket, and then see what the next shot will be. A great player will plan her shot so that she leaves the cue ball in a good spot for her next shot, or at least not in a great spot for her opponent should she miss.

Moral: Sometimes you need to decide what to leave, without knowing what comes next.

In curling, you always know that your opponent will be throwing the next stone, and once again there is a huge difference between good players and great ones. Also, curling is the ultimate team sport.

A good team will make their shots and hope for the best with what happens next. A great team will always consider a number of things before even choosing which shot to attempt:

  • What is the score?
  • What are we trying to do with this rock?
  • What will the other team likely try with their next shot?
  • Where do we ideally want all of the rocks to be when they all come to a rest?
  • What happens if we miss, and how can we miss in a way that still gives us an OK result?
  • What are we planning to try on our next shot?

Moral: Complex decisions always entail a number of questions, and the best decisions come when the members of the team know each others’ abilities, trust each other, and have a clear idea of what they are trying to do together.

The curling analogy fits best for me, as each player contributes to each shot, and a great team needs to have great players and be well coached.

Your kids are part of your team, aren’t they?

Who is coaching your family?

 

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SFTU versus STFU

Fake Dictionary, Dictionary definition of the word understand.

The year 1989 was an important one for me, as it was the year that I quit smoking, and more importantly also the year that I first met my wife. If you ask her, had I not quit smoking, I would not be her husband today.

But 1989 was also the year that one of the most important books of the last 50 years came out, and I am sure that most of you will recognize it, and many of you will have read it as well.

I not only read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, but a few of those habits have become cornerstones of how I have tried to live my life ever since. I hope that this will not lead to an analysis of just how effective I have been, but I do want to share with you my favourite habit of the seven.

Now there are a couple of the habits that are more easily recalled than my favourite, because they have become part of our vocabulary, partly thanks to the success of the book, which sold over 25 million copies.

“Think Win-Win” and “Be Proactive” have become sayings that most people will have heard before, and “Put First Things First”, and “Synergize” are also kind of cool, but still not number one on my list.

Is it “Sharpen the Saw”, or “Begin with the End in Mind”? No, but I like those too. My favourite is habit number 5, “Seek First to Understand, and Then to Be Understood”.

I like to abbreviate things, so I will just call it Seek First to Understand, or SFTU. The first time that I jotted it down using just those four letters, I was struck by how closely it resembles another 4-letter acronym, STFU. For the uninitiated, STFU is short for “Shut the Hell Up”, or something close to that.

The reason that I found this so relevant is that STFU is actually almost the exact opposite of SFTU, especially in the arena of family business and family leadership.

The old fashioned, autocratic parenting style that many of us boomers lived through was very much “this is how things are going to be”, and if anyone dared to question Dad, we were often told, essentially, to STFU, and get in line.

Nowadays, thanks in some small part to the popularity of Covey’s book but also in large part to societal changes, people have mellowed somewhat, and active listening is actually something that many leaders are taught to do.

But Seek First to Understand is not just about listening, of course. Yes, you often need to listen, and watch and read, and interpret, but the goal here is understanding.

And please note that the habit is not called “Seek to Understand”, but Seek FIRST to understand.

That little nuance is the key, because that is where the leader needs to have the maturity to admit that they do not necessarily have all of the answers, that they have the curiosity to learn about the ideas and opinions of others, and have the courage to ask and listen to what others have to say.

Those who advise families in business who are hoping to transition their business, their wealth, and ultimately their legacy to the next generation will almost all agree that clear, frequent and open communication is an absolute necessity if you want to have any chance of success in this endeavour.

Obviously, I agree. The point of this blog is to remind people that good communication is predicated on the people communicating having the right attitude so that a true exchange of ideas can be had.

I love the old quote attributed to George Bernard Shaw, “The biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it occurred”. People assume that because they said something, the other person heard and understood them. They often go even one step further and assume that the person agreed!

Please try to Seek First to Understand, and Then to Be Understood. It will be well worth it. It is a habit, so that means that it can be learned.

And it sure beats the hell out of STFU!

 

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