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Key Takeaways
- Family businesses aren’t a fallback plan. They’re among the most powerful engines of entrepreneurship in the world.
- With a family business, you inherit an in-progress story, and you have a unique advantage in that ideas don’t stop when the workday ends.
- The goal isn’t to preserve everything exactly as it was; it’s to protect the values that built the company while constantly evolving how those values are delivered.
- Understand that reputation compounds faster than revenue, and ask, “Will the next generation thank us for this decision?” instead of “Is this good for the company today?”
Our client walked out of her MBA admissions interview in tears. She had spent several minutes explaining the multi-generational family conglomerate she hoped to one day lead when her interviewer, an alumnus rather than a trained admissions officer, asked a question that stopped her cold.
“If you’re just going back to your family business, why do you even need an MBA?”
Then came the line that stung even more: “Our program isn’t interested in family businesses.”
She was stunned. I wish I could say I was, but I’ve become used to our students recounting inappropriate questions from alumni interviewers.
I told her not to complain to the admissions committee. In admissions, being right and being strategic aren’t always the same thing. A complaint before decisions were released could only create unnecessary risk. Months later, after she was admitted to that program and to the most prestigious MBA programs in the world, I encouraged her to share her experience so future applicants wouldn’t face the same dismissive assumption.
The irony is impossible to ignore. Family businesses aren’t a fallback plan. They’re among the most powerful engines of entrepreneurship in the world. They create jobs, fuel innovation and sustain communities for generations. Yet they’re often misunderstood as companies people inherit rather than companies people build. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Starting a company is difficult. Building one that survives long enough for your children and grandchildren to lead may be the ultimate entrepreneurial achievement. The Wall Street Journal recently profiled Laird & Company, a family-owned New Jersey distillery whose roots stretch back before the founding of the United States. It’s a reminder that some of the world’s most enduring businesses are the ones quietly adapting, reinventing and earning trust from generation to generation.
I know this firsthand. My family’s business, Ivy Coach, now includes personnel from a third generation. It began three-and-a-half decades ago when my mom, then a high school counselor, recognized that families navigating America’s highly selective college admissions process needed guidance that schools simply didn’t have the capacity to provide. She saw a need before there was an industry.
Over the years, I’ve helped grow Ivy Coach from a solo practitioner shop into a globally recognized college consultancy led by admissions officers from our nation’s most selective institutions while staying committed to the values that built our business.
Today, my niece and nephews are learning the business as members of our team while my son listens while crawling at my feet.
5 lessons every entrepreneur can learn from a family business
1. You inherit an in-progress story
Every generation inherits more than a company. It inherits decisions, challenges and unfinished work. A family business is an in-progress story.
At Ivy Coach, I inherited the foundation my mom built. My responsibility wasn’t simply to maintain it. Instead, it was to strengthen it and prepare it for the future. It’s why we brought on former admissions officers from Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Penn, Dartmouth, Brown, Columbia, UChicago, WashU, Duke, Northwestern and more to learn our methodologies and lead our team.
2. Holidays are your longest board meetings
Family businesses have one unique advantage in that ideas don’t stop when the workday ends. Some of the best decisions happen around the dinner table.
At Ivy Coach, many years ago, we decided to drop the “The” that preceded our name at the risk of a temporary dip in website traffic due to a URL change for the long-term gain of a more contemporary name. It was decided during the matzoh ball soup portion of a Passover seder.
3. Don’t preserve the museum, preserve the mission
Too many second- and third-generation leaders confuse tradition with strategy. The goal isn’t to preserve everything exactly as it was. Rather, the goal is to protect the values that built the company while constantly evolving how those values are delivered.
When my mom first started Ivy Coach, she charged clients hourly. But who wants to count up your hours, and who wants to debate how many hours were spent editing college admissions essays? The end product is the end product. Hourly work was cut.
4. Reputation compounds faster than revenue
Revenue can disappear in a quarter. A reputation can take decades to build and minutes to lose.
At Ivy Coach, we’ve declined opportunities that may have generated short-term revenue but didn’t align with our standards, such as participating in pay-to-play rankings of college consulting firms, which, at least at present, easily influence AI answers but don’t have any legitimacy.
5. Build something your grandchildren will be proud of
The greatest entrepreneurs aren’t only builders but stewards. The question shouldn’t simply be, “Is this good for the company today?” The better question is, “Will the next generation thank us for this decision?”
If my son someday leads Ivy Coach, I want him to understand my decision-making and his grandmother’s decision-making as a roadmap for the obstacle course he encounters. If America’s highly selective colleges one day eliminate the antiquated practice of legacy admissions, as they should, we want him to understand how to help these students navigate the admissions process on more equal footing.
The lesson the MBA interviewer didn’t understand
I often think back to that student’s MBA interview. The interviewer saw a family business as a limitation, assuming our client lacked ambition because she intended to return to her family enterprise instead of pursuing the traditional post-MBA path.
He couldn’t have been more wrong. Today, she leads her family’s multinational conglomerate, shaping thousands of jobs, influencing industries across continents and impacting communities worldwide.
The interviewer asked why she needed an MBA if she planned to return to her family business. But the question he should have asked was: “How many entrepreneurs will ever have the responsibility of leading something built not just for the next quarter, but for the next generation?”
Key Takeaways
- Family businesses aren’t a fallback plan. They’re among the most powerful engines of entrepreneurship in the world.
- With a family business, you inherit an in-progress story, and you have a unique advantage in that ideas don’t stop when the workday ends.
- The goal isn’t to preserve everything exactly as it was; it’s to protect the values that built the company while constantly evolving how those values are delivered.
- Understand that reputation compounds faster than revenue, and ask, “Will the next generation thank us for this decision?” instead of “Is this good for the company today?”
Our client walked out of her MBA admissions interview in tears. She had spent several minutes explaining the multi-generational family conglomerate she hoped to one day lead when her interviewer, an alumnus rather than a trained admissions officer, asked a question that stopped her cold.
“If you’re just going back to your family business, why do you even need an MBA?”
Then came the line that stung even more: “Our program isn’t interested in family businesses.”