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Wealth can destroy your family
All business owners, meaning anyone who owns anything of value that will be passed on to the next generation, have the potential to destroy their families through a poorly planned, unclear succession and wealth transition process.
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We are often told that a good life is an extraordinary life where we have to earn fame, money and wealth as status symbols to make our life feel worthy. (Shutterstock/File)
A
ll business owners, meaning anyone who owns anything of value that will be passed on to the next generation, have the potential to destroy their families through a poorly planned, unclear succession and wealth transition process.
And it is never enough to seal family harmony even if you require your adult children to regularly troop to your home every Sunday for lunch or dinner together with their spouses, regale you with their stories, while you playfully amuse yourself listening to your grandchildren’s out-of-tune song-and-dance number.
Despite this founder-initiated gathering that is meant to instill sibling unity, no family is immune to the dangers that wealth can generate. As a family governance adviser coaching families in Asia and America, I still get a front row seat when offspring relationships erupt into a bitter fight with the added benefit of lawyers fanning the flames in disputes over poorly and hastily crafted succession arrangements left behind by their deceased parents.
I want to share the unfortunate story of the Chadha brothers of India. An incident happened sometime in November 2012 pitting two brothers embroiled in a bitter property dispute after their father, Kulwant Chadha, died without clarifying ownership and succession issues amongst the children.
