Sara B Stern

Family Business Owner Coach | Speaker | Author

Family businesses are massively complicated and wildly common. I've spent over two decades helping them get unstuck — and stay unstuck.

Before the age of 10, I worked in my own family business. Of course, I wasn't paid for that gig. So I went down the road to the family-run orchard and picked strawberries to make some actual money. After grad school, my first real job was at a family business. Later I ran a nationally recognized family business center, and in 2015 I became an EOS Implementer.

Since then I've become the go-to person in the EOS community when it comes to family business. I regularly speak on topics like The Unsung Heroes of the EOS Toolbox for Family Businesses, The Unexpected Tool Will Transform Your Family Business, What it REALLY Means to be Owners of a Family Business — and my personal favorite — a live version of DysFUNctional Family Feud.

I have the audacious belief that family businesses could actually cause world peace. Not as a metaphor. As a real possibility. There are more family businesses on this planet than any other kind — and most of the world's adults spend most of their time working in one. That's a lot of leverage.

Owning a business is serious. Let's play.

Family Business Office Hour

Got questions about your family business — a family business client? Bring them.

The Family Business Office Hour is free, runs one Monday a month, and is exactly what it sounds like — an open hour to ask anything about how to run a healthy family business for generations. No pitch. No agenda. Just answers.

Register

The Three-Circle Model of the Family Business System

Most of my work is about helping family business owners create a healthy family business. Understanding this model and running your family business this way is where I begin with all of my clients. Often, family business conflict comes from mixing up which circle you're in. This model helps you stop doing that.

The Three Circle Model was created at Harvard in 1978 by Renato Tagiuri and John Davis and revolutionized how researchers think of family businesses. It is still a wildly helpful way to simplify how you think about family business.

Each of the circles in a healthy family business has a defined leader, succession plan, set of priorities, set of ground rules, definition of what is fair, decisions they make, and meetings.

  • Leaders

    In a healthy family business the business has a strong leader who gets to run the business without interference from the family.

    The family needs a strong leader and so does ownership. Each of the leaders should know what they are accountable for.

  • Priorities

    In a healthy family business each of the three circles has their own priorities that they use only for their circle. They do not expect the other circles to make decisions based on their own. For example, a lot of families place a high priority on harmony. That is not always the same for the business circle (which is often to make a profit).

  • Ground Rules

    All healthy family businesses have clear ground rules for how you participate in the family, the business, and ownership. In a healthy family business you can't be fired from the family but you can be fired from the business.

  • Definition of Fair

    Healthy family businesses have a different definition of fair for each circle. In the family circle, fair is equal. In the business circle fair is defined as market rate pay for a job that is needed in the business and the person is qualified to do. Fair in the ownership circle must be defined by the owners and then followed consistently.

  • Decisions

    Healthy family businesses let the family make family decisions, the business make business decisions and the owners make owner decisions. Families and owners shouldn’t be deciding who works in the business and the business shouldn’t be deciding where every family vacation is for example.

  • Meetings

    Healthy family businesses have regular meetings for each of the three circles. Family members attend family meetings, owners (or future owners) attend ownership meetings and there are business meetings at each level of the business. Be careful about this - unfortunately, a lot of people call ownership meetings family meetings and end up causing trouble with that.