A Psychological Perspective
The most fascinating corporate dramas involve family businesses. In a new book, “Family Business on the Couch: A psychological perspective”, INSEAD professors, Manfred F.R. Kets de Vries and Randel Carlock and researcher, Elizabeth Florent-Treacy, write that emotional issues that compound organisational problems are the most difficult challenges faced by family businesses.
Kets de Vries, Carlock and Florent-Treacy are widely recognised as the leading authorities on family business, having worked extensively with family business owners in Europe, the US and Asia.
“We offer two complementary frameworks to help make sense of family-run organisations,” they write. As the title “Family Business on the Couch” implies, the authors believe that the challenge is to apply psychodynamic and family systematic perspectives to the very human problems families face in business.
The genius of this book is that it is both a vivid must-read for anyone in business and an extremely practical guide for families in business and those who work with family enterprises. The authors deftly take their insightful analysis, drawn from decades of experience with families, and weave it into real-world case studies of family businesses that have succeeded and failed.
Across the world, 60% to 95% of businesses are owned or controlled by families, yet only three in ten survive into a second generation and only one in ten is handed down to a third generation. The authors demonstrate a strong understanding of the dynamics and the broad implications of this on the families and the businesses.
These business issues cannot be ignored, they argue: “Government policy makers, economists and academics now recognise that entrepreneurial and family enterprises – the oldest form of commercial organisations – are a prime source of wealth creation and employment in both developed and emerging economies.”
Coming from three of the most respected and widely published experts in the field, this book goes beyond the usual clichés to examine the root causes of common problems and to offer sound advice. “Family Business on the Couch” will help families “avoid the pitfalls that endanger both family and company”, write the INSEAD trio.
“The challenge for business families and their stakeholders is to recognise the issues that family businesses face, understand how to develop strategies to address them and more importantly, to create narratives, or family stories, that explain the emotional dimension of the issues to the family.”
About the Book
Title: Family Business on the Couch
Subtitle: A psychological perspective
Authors: Manfred F.R.Kets de Vries, Randel Carlock, Elizabeth Florent-Treacy
Published by: John Wiley & Sons
Publication date: September, 2007
Price: £29.99 Hardcover
ISBN 978-0-470-51671-3
For more information, please visit www.wiley.com.
http://knowledge.insead.edu/contents/Randy.htm
About the authors
Manfred F.R. KETS DE VRIES brings a unique perspective to the much-studied subjects of leadership and the dynamics of individual and organisational change. He is a clinical professor of leadership development and holds the Raoul de Vitry d’Avaucourt Chair of Leadership Development at INSEAD, France & Singapore. He is also the Director of INSEAD’s Global Leadership Centre. He has held professorships at McGill University, Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales Montreal and Harvard Business School, and he has lectured at management institutions around the world. He is a founding member of the International Society for the Psychoanalytic Study of Organisations. The Financial Times, Le Capital, Wirtschaftswoche and The Economist have rated Manfred Kets de Vries among the world’s top fifty thinkers on management and among the world’s most influential people in human resource management.
He is the author, co-author, or editor of more than 24 books and over 250 scientific papers as chapters in books and as articles. His books and articles have been translated into more than 25 languages. He was also the first non-American recipient of the International Leadership Award for “his contributions to the classroom and the board room.”
Kets de Vries is a consultant on organisational design/transformation and strategic human resource management to leading US, Canadian, European, African, Australian and Asian companies. He has worked in more than forty countries as an educator and consultant.
Randel S. CARLOCK is the first Berghmans Lhoist Chaired Professor in Entrepreneurial Leadership, the founding Director of the Wendel International Centre for Family Enterprise and a founding board member of the Global Leadership Centre at INSEAD. Previously he was the first Opus Professor of Family Enterprise and founder of the family business centre at the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, MN (USA). Carlock has an MA in education and training (1976), an MBA in strategic management (1983) and a PhD (1991), all from the University of Minnesota. His doctoral dissertation explored the role of organisation development in managing high growth entrepreneurial firms. He has also completed a post graduate certification in family and marriage therapy at the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College, University of London (1998) and a certificate in psychodynamic counselling at Birkbeck College, University of London (1999). He was awarded a Certificate in Family Business Advising with Fellow Status (2001) by The Family Firm Institute, Boston, MA (USA).
He is the author of several books, articles, book chapters, videos and case studies. He has over 25 years of experience serving as an executive with a global family business and as CEO and chairman of his own NASDAQ listed corporation. He currently advises global business families and corporations around the world specialising in Asia, Europe and the Middle East.
Elizabeth FLORENT-TREACY is Research Project Manager at INSEAD, France and Singapore. She works in the INSEAD Global Leadership Centre, and the Wendel International Centre for Family Enterprise. She has conducted research in the following areas: global leadership; global organisations; corporate culture in European and global organisations; American, French and Russian business practices; family business issues (governance, succession, strategy); entrepreneurial leadership; cross-cultural management; women and global leadership; cultural aspects of mergers and acquisitions; transformational leadership; expatriate executives and families; and the psychodynamics of leadership. She holds degrees in Sociology (BA) and Organisation Development (MA).
Elizabeth has written, authored or co-authored four books, 21 articles, working papers and book chapters and 18 case studies on leadership and family business topics.
