Phases of Addiction to the Family Business
We use our blog as a platform to discuss a wide range of issues. Some topics are more positive and upbeat, and other times they take a more serious tone when we feel that there is an issue that we should all discuss. We recently read an article in the Family Business Review called, “When the Family Business is a Sickness.” The author, Kenneth Kaye, discusses how some families relate “to their businesses in unhealthy ways, as if it were an addiction.”Family businesses can enable dysfunctional behaviour within families—and it’s behaviour that can carry on for generations and generations. That can cause problems for the business, the family and individual members of that family. Of course, this doesn’t apply to everyone. There are many family businesses that function beautifully. For those who it does affect, the “sickness” that we’re talking about here is an addiction to the processes of a business. This can show itself through an overwhelming need for control, “workaholism,” an over-identification with the business, etc. The thing that is so interesting (and worrying) about all of this, is that researchers have found striking similarities between the symptoms of those with substance abuse problems, and those with addictions related to the family business.
Addiction may seem like a strong word, but it’s appropriate because we’re talking about something that people will not give up (whether it is a substance, or a behaviour in the family business), even though it is negatively affecting their lives, and the lives of the people around them. The author illustrated these similarities in this table:
Phases of Addiction to the Family Business
1. Risk Factors
Inadequate self esteem
Inadequate skills
Inadequate permission to differentiate (be an individual)
2. Relief Phase
"Peer pressure": sibling and/or parental encouragement
"Escape": The family firm is a way to avoid competing in the real world
Tolerance → Dependence
Guilt → Denial and excuses
3. Crucial Phase
Remorse, failure or resolutions
Grandiose, aggressive behaviour
Loss of other interests
Money troubles, denial of responsibility, blaming
Lifestyle, inflated to compensate for emptiness, traps family member in the business
4. Chronic Phase
Loss of tolerance (too late)
Lengthy "intoxications": obsession with the business
Physical and moral deterioration
Self-loathing → hopelessness
5. "Hits bottom"
-Kaye, K. (1996). When the Family Business is a Sickness. Family Business Review, p. 354.
We’re business owners and are around business owners constantly. We get how devoted you are to your business. This blog post most certainly does not apply to everyone. But it made us stop, think and reflect—we hope it does the same for you.
