Generation to Generation: Life Cycles of the Family Business

Focusing on the inevitable maturing of families and their firms over time, the authors reveal the dynamics and challenges family businesses face as they move through their life cycles. Generation to Generation presents one of the first comprehensive overviews of family business as a specific organizational form. The book asks questions, such as: what is the difference between an entrepreneurial start-up and a family business, and how does one become the other? How does the meaning of the business to the family change as adults and children age? How do families move through generational changes in leadership, from anticipation to transfer, and then separation and retirement? This book is

A Holistic Model of our most basic economic unit Book Review: Generation to GenerationGeneration to Generation: Life Cycles of the Family Business is, in my opinion, a major contribution to the study and understanding of the complex nature of this most basic of human occupations - the family business.As a business anthropologist, I found the life-cycle model applied to the study of the family business eye opening from both an academic and practical perspective.There is a saying among family business owners and consultants that expresses the folk wisdom of about the family business as an institution and enterprise. It goes something like this , "T. The most AUTHORITATIVE work on family firms This book is the most authoritative work on family firms.Part I of the book applies the three-circle model to the characterization of different predictable development stages of family firms in different dimensions. For instance, the family dimension consists of four development stages including young business family, entering the business, working together, and passing the baton The ownership dimension consists of three development stages including controlling ownership, sibling partnership, and cousin consortium. Besides, the business dimension covers three development stages, ranging from start-. Unique Book M. Nzia Batonga Great book if you are looking for some theoretical work on family businesses. It addresses the family aspect (how the evolution of the business impacts the family and vice-versa), the business aspect (start up stage, maturity stage, etc.)and the ownership (one owner, several generations working together, extended family involvement). Most importantly it addresses the interaction between the different areas of the family owned-business.

Now a multinational conglomerate, Caterpillar began as a family firm, and many of its products are distributed through family-operated dealerships. This study takes a more analytical look at what makes family firms different from other corporations; it grew out of the authors' collaboration at the Owner Managed Business Institute, where they worked on an ongoing project for Caterpillar, Inc., that began more than a dozen years ago. David Rouse. From that work, the authors developed a model that looked at these businesses from three different a