Q4 2019

www.wealthandfinance-news.com 6 Wealth & Finance International - Q4 2019 Emotional Economics: The Challenges of Mixing Love and Money in Family Businesses and Legacy Families Edgell Franklin Pyles, PhD Thomas Edward Pyles, MA “I am what survives of me.” — Erik Erickson 1 Thirty years ago, the family business started by Daniel’s grandfather and great uncle was sold. Daniel and his three siblings received nearly sixty million US dollars each, as did each of their cousins. In 2016, Daniel, who had created a successful real estate and development business and on the advice of his financial and tax advisors, transferred to his four adult children twenty-five million US dollars each. The age range for the adult children spanned nine years, and one daughter worked in Daniel’s business. From the day gifting was announced it has resulted in family disruption. The surface discord resulted from a perceived economic injustice concerning “the time value of money” since all siblings received an equal share rather than a share based on their age. But the deeper disharmony stemmed from an unresolved historical emotional impasse between the father and one of the adult children dating back to the child’s teenage years. As Aspen Consulting Team, (ACT) we help members in family businesses and legacy families address the psychological dynamics of love and money, the interplay between emotions and economics, in the family system. Love and money are symbiotic and immiscible. They are connected, but do not mix naturally. The wrong mixture results in entitlement, disruption, and conflict; the correct mixture results in gratitude, opportunity, and resilience. The wealth connection in a family business and/or legacy family requires Mar19081 adult children to stay integrated in their family of origin much longer than typical families. The financial interdependence provides great benefits and at the same time creates complexities. A basic operating principle in our work is that the deeper the economic interconnections the higher the potentiality for emotional conflicts. Every family business and/or legacy family is a system, a combination of small subset systems (individuals) connected to mid-size systems (family units), nested within larger systems (extended and generational family units), and linked to much larger systems (business and wealth management). Everything is connected and influenced by everything else. Within this system transitioning wealth takes place at two levels where the highest goal is to provide an inheritance without creating entitlement. • The “external” work is wealth creation and management. The task of continuing the vision set by the founders, operating with the values that made the family successful in the first place, protecting assets, defining financial goals, policies, and strategies, adjusting to taxes and market changes, understanding investments and ROI, implementing shareholder agreements and distributions, creating foundations and estates, and increasing the financial portfolio. Legal and financial advisors help with this work. • The “internal” work is relationship harmony and management. The task of connecting and inspiring family members, strengthening the family culture, adapting to generational values, maintaining agreements, managing interpersonal stress, working as a team, responding to special demands, and enjoying the process as members of each generation face opportunities and transitions. This is the space in which ACT works. There are always two parallel objectives in our work. The first objective is to create guidelines to “prevent the emotional tail from wagging the economic dog.” The second objective is to “not cut off the emotional tail.” Emotions, when accessed correctly, are powerful guides and cannot be ignored without damaging relationship harmony and overlooking important decision-making data. There are more emotions in an economic experience than meets the mind’s eye. Emotions are actions, many of them are public and visible to others as they are expressed in body language or are verbalized. Feelings, on the other hand, are always hidden, unseen and perhaps unrecognized, to anyone other than their rightful owner. Feelings are the most private property we own. Emotions precede feelings, much to the common mistaken view. “We have emotions first and feelings after because evolution came up with emotions first and feelings later.” 2 We, and our emotional system, are designed to solve the basic Aspen Consulting Team www.AspenConsultingTeam.com Aspen, Colorado 970-948-1415 USA