Jörg Ritter

At Egon Zehnder, we have worked with family businesses around the world since our founding in 1964. We interviewed scores of family executives to better understand their sources of success—as well as their pain points.

Did you know that the majority (80 percent) of corporations around the world are family-owned? Yet only three percent continue operating beyond the fourth generation.

Why things are changing for HR is described in an article in the German-language Harvard Business Manager magazine (July 2017)

“Where there is no sense of belonging, money is far too highly rated as an incentive.”

"For our teams it's not about cutting costs; it's about improving processes."

In a recent study, Egon Zehnder and Family Business Network International interviewed executives at 50 of the world’s top family firms - mostly in the third or fourth generation - to discover how they unlock great leadership.

The idea that HR leaders need to be strategic business partners rather than just managing personnel is almost twenty years old. But how much progress has been made in transforming the role to date?

Leadership succession is one of the most critical and daunting tasks a family business can face. Unfortunately, there are few resources that set forth in a concise way established best practices and then provide practical guidance on their implementation.

Family businesses account for over 50 percent of large corporations in the Asia-Pacific region and many will soon be facing leadership successions for the first time. Managing these transitions effectively constitutes a major challenge, write Sonny Iqbal and Jörg Ritter, co-leaders of Egon Zehnder’s global family-business advisory, and Claudio Fernández-Aráoz, a senior adviser at Egon Zehnder, in a blog entry for the Harvard Business Review.

Family-owned and -controlled businesses represent 80 percent of companies worldwide, but by not retaining their corporate ethos or “family gravity,” or following a disciplined CEO succession process, many underperform or fail to survive according to new joint research from global executive search firm Egon Zehnder and Family Business Network International.

"Family gravity" and structured CEO succession are crucial to the long-term success of top family firms, write Claudio Fernandez-Araoz, Joerg Ritter and Sonny Iqbal in an article for the April 2015 issue of the Harvard Business Review. The article entitled “Leadership Lessons From Great Family Businesses”, spotlights global research based on interviews with 50 family-owned firms conducted by Egon Zehnder and Family Business Network International that reveals how family firms unlock value over the long term.

The CFO candidate came for ten interviews. Ten times he spoke in great detail with the managing partner of the global family company about corporate strategy, responsibilities, and their understanding of his role. Ten times they discussed the values and culture of the organization. And then, at the end of a process which lasted many weeks, this experienced executive said “thanks, but no thanks.”