It’s difficult to get along with family at the best of times. So, what’s it like going into business with them?
Around 70 per cent of businesses in Australia are family operated – so there’s something about the dynamic that works. But it can’t be easy either.
From divorce to fighting in-laws, favouritism and firing family: This week, Insight takes a look behind the scenes of the family business- the good, the bad and the ugly.
Growing up, Jason Lea lived on the premises of the Sydney Darrell Lea chocolate factory – his family’s business.
“At the age of about 10, one school holidays, we were told that we had to work in the packing room of the factory, we were packing chocolates in boxes," he says.
But the family relationships didn’t match the sweet and colourful memories generations of Australians have of the Darrell Lea business in its prime.
“They say a family that works together, doesn’t play together. That was certainly our family."
They say a family that works together, doesn’t play together. That was certainly our family.
In a turn of events that certainly didn’t help an already tense relationship, Jason’s father sacked him from the business in 1995.
“In my father’s words, I was a square peg in a round hole," he says. "I just didn't fit in with what he wanted me to continue.”
Despite all this, Jason still attended shop openings until the business was sold out of the family in 2012.
“I'm a Lea, I mean what better person would there be to get a big pair of scissors and cut the ribbon of a shop?”
Roula Angelopoulos didn’t have a choice about joining her family’s business.
Source: Supplied
When her father said it was time for her to take over his taxi fleet, she had to quit her glamorous art-directing job and learn a new trade.
“I remember the time he said to me, ‘look I'm going to Greece for a few months and I need you to just to come and take over the business. I'll be gone next week, sink or swim’,” she remembers.
But she says she wouldn’t have it any other way. For Roula, it’s about continuing a legacy her father started when he came to Australia from Greece in the mid-60s.
“He had this theory that when he came out here no one helped him, he built a life out of nothing so he wanted to see us struggle and he said that's the best training ground.”
Roula wants to keep the business in the family and says one day the next generation will take over. The question of whether they want to or not, doesn’t really matter.
“I think they might have that opportunity to follow their dreams, whatever it be, but eventually it will be in the family, someone's going to have to take it on,” she tells Insight's Jenny Brockie.
Succession planning is one of the biggest hurdles that family businesses face and with the added trust of blood relation; some families overlook this step.
Family business consultant, Philip Pryor, says many families don’t make a succession plan because they assume they don’t need to, leading to messy situations as generations go on.
“It's total chaos when a parent dies and conversations haven't been had and agreements aren't in place.”
The Bailey family have been in business together for four generations and current CEO of Bailey’s Fertiliser, Kim Bailey, would like his children to take over the business one day.
But his son Richard Bailey, doesn’t share his father’s passion.
“When you grow up knowing the family business is fertiliser, a poo factory, it doesn’t sound like a good job prospect,” he admits.
Despite a lack of passion to continue working in the business, the three siblings who make up the fourth generation Bailey’s intend to stay on.
Eldest son and co-general manager, James Bailey, says he will carry on the legacy.
The Bailey family, on Insight Source: Insight
“You kind of feel almost obliged I guess to do it as the next generation,” he says.
Co- general manager, Gen Bailey, is a little more sentimental about the fertiliser business her great, great grandfather started in the 1920s.
“When mum would be working late, we would have sleepovers at Bailley’s," she remembers. "We were always around the family business and I guess it’s in our blood.”
“Fertiliser is in your blood?” Jenny Brockie asks.
“It definitely is,” youngest son Richard Bailey, chimes in.
What’s the difference between a family business that succeeds, and one that fails? How do you maintain family relationships when you work together? This week, Insight guests talk business … relatively speaking.
This week, Insight looks at what happens when family and business mix | The Family Business - Tuesday 28 March 8.30pm SBS
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