After reading a research report, the reader frequently steps back and asks, “So what?” The stories are interesting, and the commonalities are clearly drawn, but the reader, who may not own such an advanced enterprise or who advises mostly G1 and G2 families, may wonder what really can be done with the results.

I believe this project has great import to other families who want to develop and sustain their family enterprise and that it has much to offer these families' advisors. These stories also have something to say to nonfamily businesses, which also struggle to create alignment, serve social values, and adapt to continual change. This chapter shares some of these implications and also presents a review that any business family can take to heart.

Global Context for the Future

This project began with a recognition that global family enterprise is a core social building block for civil society. In an impersonal world, the family enterprise is based on human relationships and values translated to fit the world of commerce, adding necessary humanity to the sterile landscape of the business world. Enduring family enterprises add strength, consistency, caring, and sustained productivity to the economies of every nation. Because of this, their experiences contribute a valuable alternative model to public, nonfamily enterprises.

The research documents the many contributions of these families beyond commercial success. These families have a deep impact on the community and on their loyal and long-term employees, suppliers, and customers. Business families form the economic foundation of many nations and are critical to their development. Their family nature leads them to stand for something enduring, excellent, and positive that is widely respected. They use their resources to develop and install future leaders who can continue the legacy. Business families are values-based, and their values are often as important as profits.

Generative, multigenerational families offer a model of wealth creation that diverges from the conventional model of pursuit of self-interest, focus on short-term profit, and aggressive competition. Business families play the game of private enterprise well. But they grow and remain profitable within a values-based legacy that links their success to the success of others. This model has a lot to teach to public, nonfamily businesses.

When we seek out long-lived businesses, the global terrain leads mostly to family enterprises. Public companies do not seem as resilient or adaptive. Their many unique and impactful qualities contrast favorably with those of nonfamily companies. With a family at the helm, the enterprise can sustain a vision and a set of values even as the enterprise continually takes new forms and develops new generations of leadership. A values-based enterprise can encompass not just profitability but also other social goals. Because such an enterprise looks to the long-term future and has the ability to reinvest resources, it is not uncommon for the family to consider the kind of future it desires in its community and even the world and to use the enterprise to help bring about this vision.

Family Enterprise as a Safe Refuge from Global Instability and an Opportunity to Make a Difference

To succeed over multiple generations, a generative family enterprise must prepare, develop, and most of all, recruit members of the new generation to be responsible owner/stewards. The next generation can always decide not to continue or can continue without the capability to succeed. Generative families see their next generations deciding they want to continue (though a few family members always opt out and exit the family enterprise). What attracts members of the next generations?

Family members cite the parable of the bundle of sticks: one stick can be easily broken, but when combined into a bundle, they are almost impossible to break. This is how family members see their unified family. They decide that they can do something special together that they cannot do on their own. They see the value of the family legacy and opt to continue together. They take up the challenge.

Another reason they decide to continue, despite the many challenges they face, is that the family offers a safe haven, a refuge from global instability. Family members can be trusted because they are united by blood and have a common heritage and legacy. As nations and the global economy become unstable, the family enterprise offers a place where family members can feel comfortable, accepted, and capable of making a difference. The family develops governance and sustains its unity and alignment by retaining its unity in this global climate. The legacy, skills, and capabilities of the family make up a sustainable competitive advantage for the enterprise.

Much media attention has been focused on the dysfunctional effects of wealth on young people, who are seen as excessive consumers of luxury goods and entitled people not respecting the needs or values of others. In the interviews and observations, my research team and I saw more evidence of teaching, modeling, and passing on of values of responsibility, caring and respect for others, and contributing rather than consuming. Sustaining family wealth includes restraint in consumption as well as business growth. The ways that young family members add value, innovate, and become competent professionals in their families offer a positive view of inherited wealth.

Generative families, as this book has shown, are characterized not just as good businesses or smart portfolios of assets but as being strong avenues for investing in the development and preparation of the next, rising generation. From its resources, the family puts aside funding for many forms of education, mentoring, development, and shared learning. Family members form a community of learning, and with their intentions, they create an engine that can make it happen.

Will There Be a Next Generation for Generative Families?

A family enterprise can't last forever. Though it can stem the tide of fragmentation, division, or dissolution over one or two generations, over time the extended family becomes too large to be sustained as a unified commercial entity. It then breaks up into smaller family or household units or distributes its wealth so that each individual can create his or her own future.

Do I expect that the generative families in the study will continue for further generations? My impression is that while they have been highly successful for three or more generations, many of the families in this study are not likely to survive as unified family entities for much longer than another generation. As they grow in numbers, the pressure for different paths and the sheer number of owners leads them to break down into smaller units. Individual households will exit, and businesses will be sold. There are many opportunities for the family to consider different directions, and I think the media have made a mistake to portray businesses that sell or separate as failures. A huge portfolio of businesses that offers hundreds of family descendants a legacy of values, support for personal development, a wonderful shared history, and an opportunity to make their own contribution and forge their own path cannot be seen as a failure in any way. The generative family enterprise is a choice made by some unique and dedicated families, but this choice is not right for many others.

After generations of success, each generative family has to ask itself in each generation, “Do we want to continue?” This depends on the will of the next generation to do what it takes and the strength and quality of various ventures of the family. But the key is the will of the next generation. Is there a group that has been prepared and has chosen to be ready, willing, and able to take up the reins? After several generations, it is neither a sin nor a failure to decide the answer is no.

The legacy of these families, even if it does not survive as a unified family tribe, will be seen in the values of the inheritors of these families, and their new ventures and the roles they take in the world. Beyond their family, we will see the family, before it ends as a formal entity, developing new generations of stewards and contributors. Its impact may last beyond its lifetime.

Who Can Learn from This Research?

This research offers many insights to families in the early stages of their own businesses. The wisdom of the generative family can also be used by nonfamily businesses. While most businesses are not family-owned, it's possible to create a “family feeling” among managers and employees. This can occur when employees feel that they are treated fairly and included in the decision-making process. Family enterprises make a habit of getting input from as many family members—and other stakeholders—as possible. This custom can also be adopted by nonfamily businesses. While they may not have family members, they can get input from just as many other stakeholders.

The generative families studied here create and sustain extremely successful ventures, still profitable and growing over many generations. They have arrived at this success not by focusing on short-term profits but by maintaining a long-term outlook coupled with concern for all of the company's stakeholders. This stands in sharp contrast to the current emphasis on increasing profits and raising the price of a firm's stock by whatever means possible.

I hope that the business evolution and stories of these very rare, special, and unique family enterprises have enriched our understanding of how businesses can survive and thrive over many generations.

In conclusion, my research team and I want to thank the families that shared their experiences with us and wish them a wonderful future. They are our teachers, offering a picture of how business can be successful while also looking to the welfare of their stakeholders and the future of their communities and our planet. They help us understand how a business can take a broader view of its purpose than just financial gain. I hope that generative families can serve as a model not just for other families aspiring for longevity, but also for business in general, offering a model that challenges some of the more limited views that we see around us.

Taking Action in Your Own Family Enterprise

In addition to reporting on the research, each chapter ended with a section applying the learnings to a developing family enterprise. The activities can be used by an advisor or family member to help the family look at how the insights of that chapter apply to their own activity.