Family Businesses: Navigating Multiple Roles

Day two of Clean ’17 kicked off with a pair of well-attended educational sessions hosted by TRSA, the association for the linen, uniform and facility services industry. The morning began with a presentation on family business dynamics from a business owner that works in several family owned companies and does consulting work to help executives navigate the challenges that come from operating a family owned business.

The speaker for the hour-long session was Joshua Nacht, Ph. D, The Family Business Consulting Group, Chicago. In addition to serving as a family business consultant, Nacht also is a co-owner of two family businesses, a second-generation real estate company and a third-generation technology company that he married in to the business.

During his presentation, Nacht pulled members from the audience and assigned each different roles within a family such as father, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister, non-family employee, and more. He then had each hold up signs displaying each of the various roles members of a family business are asked to fulfill. For example, one attendee held up signs that read, “Daughter,” “Sister,” “Minority Owner,” “Manager,” and “Employee.”

“With all these different roles, know which hat you’re wearing and be aware of that,” Nacht said. “Obviously, sometimes you’re wearing all of them at the same time. Sometimes it’s helpful to put on different hats and be really specific and intentional about that. Knowing about the stages of a family business, such as generation one, generation two and generation three, can help you manage these common challenges. I think one of the coolest things about family businesses is that we can see these archetypes. We can see the entrepreneur, the elements of the siblings, the elements of the cousins and what these transitions look like.”

Following his presentation, Nacht took several questions from audience members that are in family businesses themselves. Topics ranged from setting up a family employment policy for your company to managing the performance of family members.

Nacht was introduced by Jim Buik, president, Roscoe Co., Chicago. TRSA would like to thank its event partner Ecolab Inc., St. Paul, MN, for sponsoring this educational session.