in Small Business
Issue No. 3 - December/ 2001/january
Family Man on a Mission
South Australia’s 50,000—60,000 family businesses employ 55 per cent of the State’s workforce, but their owners should not expect their business to outlive them, according to visiting American consultant, Dr Leon Danco.
Dr Danco says the family firm traditionally comes to a sad end— which, to his mind, is a “damned shame” given the amount of sweat their owners put into them. His ambition is to help family business recognise and avoid the potentially fatal challenges of growth and succession planning.
“Awareness of the particular issues facing family business is only just beginning in this state and as this grows I believe that South Australian family business will further strengthen their economic contribution,” Dr Danco says.
He calls family business “the bulwark of the free enterprise system” and believes mutual support being offered through the new Family Business Assocation of Australia (FBA) is timely and worthwhile.
In Adelaide with his wife to speak for the newly—formed local division of the FBA, Dr Danco, an advisor for more than 40 years, spoke to the issues of succession planning and choosing advisors in a two—lecture set.
At 78, he is enthusiastic but relentless. Half of all family firms disappear five to 10 years after they’re founded. A second generation of the family takes the reins only 16 per cent of the time, and only 5 per cent of firms are still family owned when the founder...
