Chapter 8

Success Tips for Family Business Owners, Employers, and Professionals

Danny Miller and Isabelle Le Breton-Miller studied 46 successful family businesses, including Wal-Mart, Nordstrom’s, Bechtel, Coors, Corning, Fidelity Investments, Tyson, IKEA, and Cargill. The researchers’ purpose was to uncover what made these firms so successful and gave them the ability to thrive as family firms. They arrived at what they called the four Cs: continuity (a long-term focus), community (a strong cohesive team focused on values), connection (a deep relationship with key stakeholders such as the local community and suppliers), and command (an empowered top management team unfettered by bureaucratic rules, thus enabling them to move fast and seize ...

Get Understanding The Family Business now with the O’Reilly learning platform.

O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.