Succession or Promotion? E-Book

Hamilton Ibanes

• Herausgeber: Ás Editorial
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 145

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

It shouldn't be like this, but a Founder's succession in a company signals a not-so-generous change in command. It feels as if someone who had been the topmost representative of a company until "yesterday" is being ejected, or even expelled from the organization, no matter how big or a small your business is. Lack of planning and empathy, which causes trauma and veritable nightmares during such a transition, occurs in small, medium, or large companies. THIS BOOK'S GOAL IS TO BREAK THAT PARADIGM. From traditionally passing on the scepter as an act of succession and replacement, to the promotion of a Founder, who has set up a company that generates wealth to many families, to a city, a state, a country, or the whole world... Our proposal is to prepare Founders for the ongoing journey of life with new challenges and to sensitize successors so they can recognize the Founder's legacies, and choose to take over their responsibilities and follow their steps, or do even better, with that which has been built. A successful succession plan will foster harmony within the family, support the prearranged agreements among partners, and enable successors to have an outstanding performance. The invitation is to harmony. Let's cheer for the Founders and their brilliance. Let us cast a challenging look on the succession of those men and women who have been dutifully promoted to a new age in their lives. Enjoy your promotions, and your reading!

Leseprobe

Copyright © Hamilton Ibanes

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the copyright holder.

Executive Editor: Maurelio Barbosa

Text Preparation: Luzia Santos

Proofreading: Rosalina Siqueira

Cover, graphic design, layout and graphic production: Ás Editorial

International Publication Data

Tuxped Serviços Editoriais (São Paulo-SP)

Librarian Pedro Anizio Gomes CRB-8/8846

I12s Ibanes, Hamilton.

SUCCESSION OR PROMOTION? A New Outlook Into Succession Planning / Hamilton Ibanes; Prefácio de Sueli Noronha Kaiser. – 1. ed. – Jundiaí, SP.

144 p.; 14x21 cm.

Sources included.

ISBN 978-65-86369-41-0.

1. Family. 2. Governance. 3. Promotion. 4. Sucession. I. Title. II. Topic. III. Ibanes, Hamilton.

CDD 342.165

CDU 347.61

Catalog Index

1. Hereditary Rights / Succession Rights.

2. Family Rights.

This book is dedicated to Founders.

Men and Women who dared believe,

who were enthusiastic entrepreneurs

in such a complex country as Brazil.

And they did it with their eyes focused on Reinventing

and a great deal of heroic persistence.

You are an enterprise.

Take care of yourself, and you’ll be taking care of everything and everyone.

“Keep your inner child alive.”

Hamilton Ibanes

Forward

Here’s to Tomorrow!

One of the most astounding human abilities is empathy. From the Greek empátheia, meaning “passion”, empathy is one of the noblest skills in the heart and soul of a human being. To be able to feel what somebody else is feeling, to act or think as others act or think, truly and certainly, this is empathy. To look long and deep into somebody else’s eyes and understand their feelings, guess at their doubts, measure their reasons – this is empathy. When you exercise generous acceptance and fraternal respect to emotions and experiences which are not your own, then you’re being empathic. It is a feeling that is reserved to a rare spirit, an aptitude particularly molded for Hamilton Ibanes.

In addition to his several professional competencies, it was empathy that linked Hamilton to me and my family. We had been treading the inevitable path of corporate governance. For the family company I had created as a yet unheard-of segment in Brazil, time and business expansion had become imperative for establishing professional management. In this respect, my four children and I saw that our business’s Organization and Security for the future generations were the largest assets in corporate governance.

But the meanders of governance would inevitably involve the succession issue. It was a natural human move, which I had always faced not without a great deal of emotion, with the expectation of someone who sees their seeds sown in fertile ground. Seeds which had been scattered to blossom, to grow, and to be everlasting – with or without my presence. Long before the days of business organograms, Father Antônio Vieira had taught us that “to be aware of your succession is to acknowledge mortality.” And as I looked anxiously into the future, I suddenly became aware of the generous and professional presence of the author of this book. My genuine concern was to maintain the company’s essence, to keep nurturing the culture of excellence in the home-care field, a rich and fundamental human factor that governs the whole dynamics of patient assistance. Hamilton immediately realized the reason of my concerns. He knew it wasn’t about an overzealous Founder’s whims. He knew it was about the experienced eye of one who had established the foundations of her company so that it would become worthy and suitable for corporate governance.

Hamilton felt my feelings and thought my thoughts. He absorbed with empathy and simplicity my most troubled questions and doubts. He turned out to be a congenial and honest friend in our midst and respected our standards and business values. He highlighted our work, our efforts and our struggle. We soon began to feel nothing but respect and tenderness towards him, not only because of his empathy, generosity and commitment with our future goals, but mostly because of his dedication and his wide scope of knowledge, which he never ceased to demonstrate throughout the whole period of our implementing governance.

And it is for these privileges that have been conferred by our affinity that I now introduce this work by Hamilton Ibanes. This new and evocative volume can masterfully guide, smoothen and light up the way for family businesses seeking management solutions and alternatives to their numberless challenges. To those companies that have been built from dreams, forged with courage, erected upon faith and determination, generating jobs, income, dignity and development, I recommend the author’s thorough and generous vision into their future. The following pages will enthrall the reader with the poignant and admirable features of an author who writes so smoothly: empathy, candidness, respect and emotion. All good things that a family deserves.

With our dear Hamilton, a special and multitalented professional, a dear friend to me and my family, I propose a toast to tomorrow! Because that’s where life is always headed.

Sueli Noronha Kaiser1

1. Founder, partner and president of the Administrative Council of Grupo Cene, affiliate of Grupo Mulheres do Brasil. She trained and certified the first team of Cardiac Surgery Nurses for the Beneficiência Portuguesa Hospital, in Rio Preto (SP, Brazil), where she worked for 37 years. She was elected governor of Rotary Internacional for two terms, the first woman elected for District 4480, responsible for 42 cities.

Contents

Forward

Introduction

CHAPTER 1

  Founder’s Profile

CHAPTER 2

  Human Difficulties

CHAPTER 3

  Three in one and the distorted mirror

CHAPTER 4

  Dependence Syndrome

CHAPTER 5

  The Preparation

CHAPTER 6

  Wishes and arrangements

CHAPTER 7

  The secret of a successful promotion/sucession

CHAPTER 8

  Succession and the passing-on of the scepter

CHAPTER 9

  Promotion

CHAPTER 10

  The future is now

CHAPTER 11

  The unusual stages

CHAPTER 12

  The impacts on human dimensions

CHAPTER 13

  The choice of being

CHAPTER 14

  The journey as told by founders and successors

CHAPTER 15

  Life goes on... also for founders

CHAPTER 16

  Risks and opportunities

Conclusion

Sources

Introduction

“A single moment may change a day.

A day may change a life.

A life may change the world.”

Buddha

My childhood’s experiences, abundantly meaningful and thrilling, are my recurring source of inspiration for good and grand purposes. It is amazing how the things that were lived by such a young person have been conducive of my professional activities in the last few years.

My family history has made me strongly connected and emphatic to many other families that I can help today. I clearly remember examples of next of kin. They were groundbreaking, successful entrepreneurs who had provided for their own families and several others, and at the end of their journey could enjoy the benefits of their efforts. However, they were hardly recognized in their lifetimes. I have seen a great number of companies discard their founders as if they had become obsolete products. As they aged, they were literally put aside.

That being said, the idea of this book is to demystify this unkind practice. As human longevity increases worldwide, men and women who were founders may definitely keep on contributing to their companies, and they can do it even after handing over their Scepter, so to speak, the topmost representation in succession.

I firmly believe that chronological age has little to do with people’s ability to update themselves and never stop contributing to the makings of a better world. And this had made me think of ways in which we can recognize and treat with dignity and respect those people who started out from nothing and have, nevertheless, created wealth for society. This book is the result of those reflections, the conception that human nature needs security, tenderness, a friendly shoulder, from its birth to its final breath. A baby will feel safe in its mother’s lap. On the highways of our lives, the need is reversed: the baby has become an adult and will lavish another being with tenderness and understanding, offering a safe shelter to someone who needs it.

A Founder’s condition is very similar. More often than not, succession represents the moment when the Founder feels abandoned, fragile, vulnerable. Founders are those who have provided comfort and security, created jobs, supported families, contributed to society; and all of a sudden they find themselves at fate’s mercy. But that feeling will only come when there’s no safe, honest or fair plan in sight.

The framework for this thought is the principle that each individual must think of his or her life as a living organism. Besides ethical principles, people need to be economically stable so they can be emotionally balanced once their physical and mental activity slows down.

Preparation must get started really early. The entrepreneurial cycle is strongly attached to the pendulum of existence. So the sooner a Founder plans a safe, correct and worthy way to step down the stage, the greater will be the legacy to society from those men and women.

Shall we begin our journey?

Have a nice trip!

Chapter 1

FOUNDER’S PROFILE

“Everyone is responsible for modeling out mankind’s future.

We should therefore contribute to it as best as we can.”

Dalai-Lama

Before we analyze the Founder’s profile more deeply, it is imperative we understand that humans find self-analysis something of a puzzle, as we are slow to recognize our strengths and weaknesses. We find it hard to look deep into ourselves, and we unconsciously project our problems into somebody else, or in the market out there, in the competition. When leadership comes from a family-owned company, those factors are magnified and may be perpetuated through several generations.

What truly intervene in an individual’s full deportment are his or her surroundings. After all, education is based upon principles that have been handed down from one generation to the next. That is how the features of an entrepreneur or a pioneer will be passed on to the young generations in the present world’s Startups.

Bain & Company’s recent research (2016), as depicted in Chris Zook and James’ The Founder’s Mentality, confirms that the great entrepreneurial challenges are internal and far less visible than the external occurrences, such as the coronavirus crisis, for instance.

Unprecedented

A Founder’s major stimulation is his or her intemperate, pioneering attitude to believe in something that nobody else has yet tried. This can be translated as boldness, aggressiveness, courage, or an entrepreneurial spirit. Indeed, when you start from scratch, you are actually driven by an unshakeable faith in your ability to meet any challenge, and by your ambition and undaunted desire to make things happen.

Confidence is equally vital. The Founder is someone who believes in him/herself and is greatly motivated to march ahead. Founders invest in their dreams. They rise after inevitable falls. Founders run businesses that supply the needs of a great many people – sometimes very basic needs.

That is why one must proceed with caution. The same confidence that led young entrepreneurs to the full realization of their dreams may be totally lost if they are not prepared for the moment when Creator and Creature must part.

It is a highly delicate and widely studied issue. In his book The Hero’s Farewell – What Happens When CEOs Retire, Jeffrey Sonnefeld shows the result of his research on the profiles of Founders/CEOs. The book gives you a better comprehension of that process and helps you pave the way for succession.

According to the author, some Founders/CEOs choose their successors wisely. Others, however, resist progress and must be forced to leave, which could be traumatic both for the individual and the organization.

Fifty years ago, psychologist Otto Rank suggested that mankind’s millenary struggle has been to beat life’s apparent lack of meaning, the fear that comes from knowing that life will end in death. The heroic impulse, according to Rank, is an expression of our effort to reach immortality.

Society has generated expectations that leaders should play the role of the hero in the companies’ fate. Most will seek out and accept that role, and will play it out enthusiastically as long as they are in command. But when the time comes to step down and let almost invariably a younger successor step in, many are the founders, leaders and top corporate executives who are plagued with the fears enunciated by Otto Rank: “Quitting your position means losing your heroic stance, diving into the pit of insignificance, a kind of mortality.”

Sonnenfeld is not alone in his discoveries. Other researches and statistical surveys – including various approaches – have also pointed out similarities in succession planning.

Common Grounds

Establishing a succession planning program involves an impact in social, family and psychological levels.

On the social level, there is loss of status. There is no denying that carrying the title of Founder of a successful com­pany is a social raiser. Doors will open, your voice will be heard and your name will automatically ring in people’s minds as “Success.” And though the Founder may not be com­pletely carried away, this sort of status is far too refreshing a beverage for him or her to quit drinking. Additionally, stepping down from a high position such as “founder” is not always voluntary, and the socia