Engaged Ownership

AMELIA RENKERT-THOMAS jointly founded Withers Consulting Group, an award-winning international family-business consultancy. She works with families and enterprises of all shapes and sizes, from entrepreneurs coping with the consequences of liquidity events to large multi-generational families with highly sophisticated business and investment structures. She helps families to design tailored governance structures, create more effective board structures, form and govern family offices, set up shareholder councils, and make trusts more—functional.Her understanding of the complexities family businesses face stem not only from her consulting work but also from her own family background. She is the former President of Ironrock, Inc., her family's fifth generation manufacturing business, and the granddaughter of the founder of Fisher Price Toys.Amelia's consulting work fills a void between family dynamics and management consultancy. Her work reduces and manages the conflicts that can be created by structures of ownership, such as voting and non-voting shares, trusts, partnerships, and foundations, all of which are very familiar to Amelia as a trained lawyer. Her work on ownership has been referred to as "the missing piece of the puzzle" for family businesses.Because of her mix of personal and professional experience, Amelia is often asked to comment in the press and provide consulting and training for families and family business advisers alike.

• Foreword xiPreface xiiiAcknowledgments xxivPart: I Engaged Ownership: An IntroductionPrologue 3Chapter 1 More at Stake than Money 9Chapter 2 Achieving Engaged Ownership 21Chapter 3 Engaged Ownership: Hallmarks and Impediments 29Part: II Getting OrganizedChapter 4 Family Business Roles and Relationships 45Chapter 5 The Legacy of the Past: Natural Governance, Family History, and Culture 55Chapter 6 Enumerating Core Capital 69Chapter 7 Shared Purpose 85Chapter 8 Vision and Mission 93Chapter 9 Is It “Good Enough”? 103Chapter 10 Alternatives to Engaged Ownership 107Part: III Practicing Engaged OwnershipChapter 11 Forums 117Chapter 12 Allocating Power among Owners, Board, and Management 125Chapter 13 Working with Other Forums 135Chapter 14 Meetings 145Chapter 15 Policies 153Part: IV Three Challenges: Hats, Trusts, and Outside InvestorsChapter 16 When an Owner Also Runs the Enterprise 161Chapter 17 When an Owner Is Also a Trustee 171Chapter 18 Bringing in Outside Investors 179Chapter 19 Epilogue 185Appendix A Sample Decision Grid 189About the Author 195Index 197