There are many great family business advisors who can help you grow and scale your business, tie your mission and vision to a strategic plan, and, in some cases, manage your wealth. It’s an industry full of competent and brilliant people who can help you build your business.

Finding Professionals with Shared Values

As I began to look around the industry through the lens of working in my father’s business—and later losing equity—I had a hard time finding professionals who could help with the emotional side of running a family business. Not having the same values nor even dealing with the relationships in our family who worked together was the demise of our family business. 

That’s why I started Family Wealth Library, and that’s why I am passionate about promoting authors who write on topics such as passing values on to the next generation and emotionally dealing with things such as addiction or death. 

Some of those authors are highlighted at the end, under the “reading” sections. Before you get there, though, I’d like to spend a little time talking about how to pass values down from generation to generation.

Family Values Through Generations

The way one generation passes on its values to the next usually reflects the same philosophy as the transfer of wealth. If someone passes on the value of compassion and service, they also will likely pass financial assets to charity. 

The challenge that many leaders in family businesses face, however, is they’ve been mostly focused on the transference of financial wealth and don’t realize how important the transfer of values is until well into their senior years. 

Lessons on Passing Down Values

Ellen Perry, the founder and principal at Wealthbridge Partners, says she has learned five valuable lessons in working with clients about passing on values.  

  1. Values are caught, not taught.
  2. Values are different from beliefs, preferences, choices, and principles.
  3. Leading a life that is consistent with your values is the greatest predictor of happiness.
  4. Storytelling is a powerful means of sharing your values. 
  5. If the family is to flourish for multiple generations, the attention to human capital should be as serious as that of financial capital.

If you are coming at this later in life, you can imagine—or perhaps are even experiencing—working on transferring values to adult children is an insurmountable task. It can be done, but it won’t be easy.

The good news is passing on values to the next generation(s) can still be done. It’s not too late.

According to Richard Eisenberg in a Forbes article, you can go the formal or the informal route to talk about what’s important to you after you’re gone.

Your options might include:

  • Discussions during holiday gatherings about what’s important to you 
  • Bringing in a pro to help facilitate the conversation(s)
  • Start demonstrating the values you want to be passed down by acting like a role model

There is no better time than right this second.

Recommended Reading

Further Reading at Family Wealth Library 

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