The Succession Conspiracy
Everyone says "let's wait a little longer": the parents find it early, the child leaves the decision to their elders, the professionals stay out of it. Its name in the literature is the succession conspiracy; the solution is to build a structured environment of communication together.
Transcript
Description (Instagram Reels)
In family businesses, the parties unknowingly form a postponement alliance — a successionThe transfer of management and ownership in a family business to the next generation — approached not as a moment of 'handover' but as a long development journey that begins with growing the next generation. See in glossary → conspiracy. This is one of the biggest obstacles to the sustainability of family businesses.
Not planning succession is also a choice. But most of the time it is a bad choice. Instead of leaving this process to a moment of crisis, you need to start talking about it now, within a structured environment of communication.
Transcript
It is genuinely hard to find someone who wants to talk about succession in a family business. Because all the stakeholders of the process avoid sitting down and making a plan together. Each stakeholder has something in mind, but none of them lays it out openly. "Let's wait a little longer," everyone says.
The parents say, "It's early." The child says, "My parents will decide anyway." The professional managers in the company say, "I won't get involved, this is a family matter." This situation actually has a name in the literature too.
It is called the succession conspiracy. The alliance to postpone succession. Picture it as a state in which everyone is trying to put it off. But the issue is not really who will start the process. The issue is that no structured environment of communication, where everyone can come together and talk easily, has been built.
So a first step needs to be taken. And the first step that needs to be taken is not taken by one person. You know how everyone keeps waiting for someone else to take it. Whereas in this process a step to be taken together should be planned. Now, this is a state of avoidance and inertia.
And when this state runs its course within the family, problems actually erupt. Once a problem erupts, the need to solve the matter comes onto the agenda. It comes up not like a planned journey, but like a subject one is forced to think about out of necessity. Not planning succession is also a choice, but most of the time a bad one.
Source: Instagram Reels · Posted: June 9, 2026. The media link is in the "Medya URL" field.