As outlined last Friday, as from the 20th June, a serious of online sessions will be launched with the aim of providing targeted training for family businesses. The 1st session on the 20th June and the last session on the 29th July will also be done in a hybrid format, to allow family business to network between them. All training sessions will be recorded and available online.

However, today I wanted to start outlining the content of such training.

The first session will be an Introductory Session which will lay the foundations for the rest of the training sessions. In this session, called the “Need to Survive”, we will be discussing the following:-

• What makes family businesses distinct from other types of businesses.
• The Power to Sustain and the Power to Destroy that family businesses have.
• The building blocks (Individuals, Relationships and Systems) that make up a Family Business – which will give you an insight as to whether you really know your family business.

The second session will focus on designing your family business ownership. This topic is very important as the type of family ownership will significantly influence the governance, structures, strategy, communication and succession plan of the family business. In this session we will focus on:

• Knowing what type of family ownership you really want – Who is eligible to be an owner? Which owners will have control?
• Understanding the present and future implications of different ownership types.

In the third session we will focus on the Governance structure of a family business. In this session we will be focusing on the importance of creating governance structures that balance the needs of family owners (both those directly involved and those not directly involved in the business), directors, advisers and management. Many times family businesses do not realise that their governance structure is lacking until they hit major problems with decision making, like investments done without consulting anyone and the list goes on. Moreover as the number of family members involved in one way or another in the business increases over time, the need for good governance structures becomes more urgent. In this session we will be focusing on:-

• What governance structures to create and which decisions should be made in the different structures
• What processes can be used to make sure that the different governance structures are aligned and interconnected.

The above was just a taste of the first three sessions. In the coming days I will provide you with an outline of the remaining sessions which will discuss:

• The need for a Strategic mindset in Family Businesses
• Effective Communication and proper Information flow in family Businesses
• Succession Planning in Family Businesses
• Dealing with Various Challenges particular to Family Businesses: Dealing with Conflict, Preserving family wealth, Family Employment Policy.

As I hope you have realised so far, this training is being setup in he most convenient way and specifically targeted for family businesses, besides being completely free. I think its an opportunity not to be missed. Please register HERE to follow these sessions.