Author: wilks

I called myself wilks when I first started blogging. The idea was that it would afford a measure of anonymity. For much the same reason, there was no photo. Times change, hence the photo, but I decided that even when I changed the blog’s title at the start of 2009, I should remain wilks.

“Little Red Riding Hood has to go!”

Back from a day in Bristol at Familiarity 2009, a conference for family businesses and their advisers. What makes this conference different is that the speakers are prepared to share their stories. So it isn’t just the usual death by Powerpoint. There can be, and there was today, not just a great deal of insight but a lot of emotion.Family businesses have all the problems and issues that other businesses have; likewise the family members have all the problems and issues that other families have. It is just that there is often no separation: things happen in the both business space and the family space at the same time, and often in the same place.

For me, as a professional advising family businesses, and as an outside non-executive director of a family business, there was also a lot on which to reflect. But that is for later; for now, just some of the quotes that stuck in my mind:

From Steve Fudge, MD of Dorset Village Bakery aka Fudges

Little Red Riding Hood has to go!

As Steve explained, this was one of the first things his non-family director said when he arrived.  LRRH has some 122 pages, but we all know the outcome, and it can be summed up in four words only – the wolf ate Grandma. So cut the waffle!

From Mandy Nickerson, MD of Bales Worldwide Travel,

We need to recognise our own success

All too often we are ready to recognise this in others, but we rarely look at we have achieved. Mandy also told us that there was not enough fun in business – but there should be. And she talked about how they deal with complaints (disarming customer terrorists).

And from John Tucker, of The International Centre for Families in Business, when talking about advising family businesses on ownership, control and succession

There are two questions you need to ask, and which are often very difficult to answer: who is family? And who isn’t?

Employer brand?

Once a week in the FT’s Business Life column, Stefan Stern tells it like it is.  If you have no time for anything else, read him. Today’s column is as good as ever, Why you should pay attention to your employer brand. It is, or should be, common sense: and as important for law firms as for any one else: especially in the present economic climate.

You need to present a coherent and plausible sense of yourself as an organisation. That means having a robust employer brand: knowing who you are, and being able to tell a good story about yourselves.

This happy scenario will not come about by chance. It requires leadership and a sustained communications effort. You may need to bring to the surface your organisation’s values and attitudes that have remained tacit or undiscussed until now.

How did you deal with your lay-offs? And how will you deal with your next round of recruiting?

Crisis-driven change

The opening quote of Francesco Guerrera’s Analysis article in this morning’s FT caught the eye, “A crisis is a terrible thing to waste” (but then I don’t work at Citigroup, so hadn’t heard it before).

What struck me, however, and what is applicable to law firms as much as any other business was this,

Experts argue that although most companies see the need to reform in a crisis, many embark on the wrong kind of change. A common mistake is to go for across-the-board job and cost cuts that weaken the company without sharpening its core businesses. “The first thing you have to do is to protect and strengthen the core,” says Bain’s Mr Rigby. “In the same way our bodies allocate blood flow away from expendable extremities in favour of vital organs during a crisis, companies must make sure their best markets and consumers are protected.”

Driving change may be easier in times like these, but, as Guerrera notes,

In the middle of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, companies face a daunting choice. Do they exploit the tough times to lose the ballast accumulated during the boom years and make risky strategic changes in the hope of emerging as lighter but stronger organisations? Or do they adopt a defensive stance, trying to weather the storm without rocking the boat until their markets and the economy rebound?