Author: Kathy Marshack

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People – Making in the Family Business


By Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S.

When she was about six, I overheard my eldest daughter describing my work to one of her school friends. She said, “A psychologist is a mommy who sees clients in the basement.” At the time my office was located in the basement of my home, remodeled for just that purpose. And, since I often work at home, my daughter has been able to see me in many of my roles, the most important to her, of course, is that of “mommy.”

Being the owner-manager of a family firm requires juggling many roles, too, not just with family members but with employees as well. The way marital and family obligations are handled affects management style with employees and vice versa.

For example, in family firms where spouses work together, management style must be assessed in three arenas: 1) marital, 2) parenting, and 3) business management. Furthermore, the integration of these three styles must be assessed.

What is your marital style?

Let’s take marital style first. Are you both leaders? Is one the leader and the other the support person? Does the style change depending on context? Are you a team? Or are you both separate and dedicated to your own spheres? Does your marital style differ greatly from your parenting style or your management style?

Marital partners find each other for myriad reasons. Some are attracted to opposites. Some want someone like Mom. Whatever your marital style – know it. Don’t assume that it is irrelevant in your family firm. This style shows in the boardroom and on the production floor. If it is incompatible with the business, then you will have many problems. Employees sense the discrepancies. They know when there has been a marital fight.

What kind of a parent are you?

If a couple has children, whether they work in the business or not, be aware of parenting style too. Parenting style is affected by business-management style and vice versa. We learn a lot from our children about human behavior. Those lessons are translated to the work place.

Are you an authoritarian parent? One business owner orders his family around at home just as he does his employees at work. His wife and children don’t like it and are, in fact, a bit intimidated by him, but he says he can’t help himself. Are you permissive? Permissive parents often have children who are rebellious because they have always had to make their own decisions. Are you authoritative? This type of parent generally has a good balance and makes decisions as the leader of the family, but includes children when appropriate so that the children gradually learn the responsibilities of adulthood.

Parenting style is obviously related to marital style. If two marital partners do not think alike about parenting, there will be a disorganized, and possibly, very depressed family. Discussing differences about parenting and making a united plan is the best thing parents can do for the family structure. Equally so, it is important that parent/owners determine if they are treating employees the way they treat their children.

What about your management style?

Management style at work is the third aspect of family/business style that needs to be evaluated. It can be categorized as one of the four styles: 1) telling, 2) selling, 3) participative, 4) delegating. Which are you? Are you apt to tell employees what to do? Or do you build a good case for what they should do? Or do you include employees or other managers in the process of developing new business? Finally, are you inclined to run the show yourself but delegate tasks to team members?

Americans have been successful in the world marketplace because of their emphasis on the “rugged individualist.” We have been willing to fight to protect the rights of the individual. But as we move into the 21st century, Americans are beginning to realize that we are all part of one planet and one global economy.

We cannot afford to be isolationists. We have influence and others influence us.

Members of a family firm are in the position of understanding these influences better than most. A family business is a delicate balance of the interacting systems of marriage, family and business. How you manage and respond to these systems will determine your success.

An authoritarian father with a “telling” business-management style and a traditional marriage characterizes the entrepreneurs of the 1940s. But, because that model is so dominant, many family-business members don’t know what other styles exist. If following in Dad’s footsteps works for you, look no further. But, if you desire alternative styles to keep up with the changes in your business and your personal life, look for answers to the questions in this article.

Will your style work in the 21st century?

First accept who you are. Whatever your style, it is probably the most comfortable way for you to be. This doesn’t mean there is no room for improvement. But it’s best to start with who you are and then to build marital, parental, and management styles around your personality.

Second, accept your spouse’s style, too. She or he has developed a certain personality that is unlikely to change. Rather, you two are looking for ways for both of you to realize your full potential. Don’t compromise before you have explored all of the ways for both of you to be fully who you are in the marriage and as parents.

Third, when considering a parenting style, not only do your consider your partner’s style, but you must also include the personalities and needs of your children. Most parents are astounded at how wildly different each one of their children are. While a permissive style may be appropriate for one child, another may require more authority.

Fourth, remember that your management style at work is more related to your marital and parenting styles than you realize. It is in the family that we first learn to relate to others. We learn about male/female relationships from our mothers and fathers. We learn about power and control and decision-making, too. We learn about love and friendship and sibling rivalry or competition.

These early lessons shape us for the rest of out lives. How you treat employees and how you want them to treat you is dependent upon your understanding and utilization of these early lessons.

The business of people making.

Virginia Satir, a noted family therapist once said that parents are in the business of “people making.” In a family business, I think this is true in more ways than one. As parents, certainly our children are shaped by the family firm – just as my daughter saw me as a mommy

who works in the basement. And, as family-business owners and managers, your employees are also shaped by your marital/parenting/management style. You can cultivate the best in your people or contribute to something much less desirable.

Understanding your unique management style in the workplace and how you have integrated past and present family lessons into a family business will help you to be flexible and to adapt to the requirements of the 21st century.

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Are you ‘Daddy’s little girl’ in the family business?


By Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S.

My mother was fond of telling me this little aphorism when I was a girl. Perhaps it was because she had two daughters and no sons. Or perhaps it is because she was the only daughter in a family of sons. Whether she was trying to teach me the lesson, or to merely advise me of a fact, I have noticed the truth in this saying more often than not.

The value of relationships does seem to be more important for women than for men. Not that men do not enjoy loving relationships, but that women tend to define themselves more in terms of their relationships. Women and girls are more willing than men and boys to put their needs aside to maintain a relationship. Within a family firm for example, it is often the wife who does not take a formal salary. She is equally likely to forgo a formal title in the corporation, although she is just as hardworking an asset to the business as her husband.

Likewise with daughters. Daughters in family firms often see their roles as supportive of the family. They are not as driven to be leaders as are their brothers. This does not mean they do not want recognition. Rather their first priority is to ensure the success of the loving relationships. After all, these relationships came before the business. They are the driving force behind the business; the reason it came into being.

The research indicates that family owned firms were started by their founders primarily as a way to support the family. The women in family firms still recognize this intent long after the men have turned their attention to developing a thriving enterprise.

But this concern for family first often gets in the way of founders considering their daughters as successors. Although their daughters may be hardworking, college educated, committed to the family enterprise, and have many other talents, founders most often groom their sons to succeed them in the leadership of the business. The research shows that even founders who have no sons overlook the possibility of a daughter taking over the business.

Considering the importance women place on nurturing the family, and considering that a successful family firm requires a cohesive and committed family, daughters may be the most likely choice to succeed the founder of a family firm. In her study of 8 family firms, Collette Dumas identified the roles that daughters typically plan in family firms. Dumas chose only those family firms where the daughters held management positions. She also identified the qualities that make for a successful transition of leadership from fathers to daughters in family firms.

The majority of fathers and daughters that Dumas interviewed expressed great difficulty in managing the ambiguity in defining the daughter’s roles in the family and in the family business. The roles assigned by both fathers and daughter ranged from “Daddy’s little girl”, which emphasizes a fragile, defenseless, dependent position, to that of a tough and independent manager in the business.

While the daughters studied were capable and assumed several roles in the family business, their primary role with their fathers (and which was learned at an early age) was that of defenseless dependent. As one daughter put it, “Even though I’ve been working here a long time, I still have to kiss him every morning. Otherwise he’ll be hurt. I don’t think he’s made the transition to seeing me as an adult. I’m still his little girl.”

While sons may also stay boys in their father’s eyes, at least sons come into the family business with the expectation that someday they will take over. Daughters rarely have this illusion. Therefore, they may remain Daddy’s little girl indefinitely. This position leads many daughters in family firms to struggle with a sense of identity. Many daughters in family firms, as well as their mothers, work wide by side with their brothers, yet their names are not on the organizational chart.

All of the fathers Dumas interviewed reported that they had never considered their daughters as potential successors in the business before their daughters came to work for them. And all the fathers reported that long periods of time went by after their daughters came to work for them before they considered the idea. Dumas refers to this phenomenon as the “invisible successor.” Only when a crisis emerge where the daughter was needed to help out Dad, did either party consider her potential as a successor. Unlike sons, who come to work for the family business to further their career and eventual ownership, daughters come into the family business out of dedication to Dad and the family.

As a result of struggling with these issues (role ambiguity, invisibility and identity), daughters in family firms develop one of three styles according to Dumas: “Caring for the Father,” “Taker of the Gold,” or “Caretaker of the King’s Gold.”

In the first style, “Caring for the Father,” the daughter may feel a lack of purpose and direction. She has not developed a clear and strong identity. Such people often attach themselves to strong leaders or father figures and become dependent on them in an attempt to fell “alive.” In the family firm these daughter are largely oriented toward pleasing the father and caring for his comfort and wishes. His needs come before the daughters.

While there is nothing unhealthy about caring for another person, to do so exclusively not only robs the daughter of her identity, but may harm the firm. If the daughter’s behaviors are oriented toward caring for her father to the exclusion of actions that would be beneficial to the organization’s effectiveness and survival, she will not be prepared to take over the CEO’s role when she succeeds him.

In the second style, “Taker of the Gold,” the daughter has taken the opposite extreme by developing a rigid identity or sense of self. She works hard to achieve, even overachieve, but she thinks only of herself. In the case of daughters trying to become independent of fathers, the takers-of-the-gold become more interested in taking charge of the business assets than in responding empathetically to the father or recognizing this accomplishments.

While these daughters are strong and quite capable, they operate independently and thus do not take advantage of the resources available to them to make informed decisions. These daughters have behaviors that are rebellious and disrespectful of the business’s norms. In the long run this style produces a great deal of conflict between father and daughter and potential distress for the business.

The third style, “Caretakers of the King’s Gold,” represents a midpoint between the first two styles where the structure of the identity is harmonious and stable and at the same time less rigid and dramatic. This daughter suffers less from a sense of inner emptiness and is less inclined to continuously prove her existence to others. In other words, this healthy sense of identity allows the daughter in a family firm to simultaneously take charge and take care of the “king’s gold” (the business), “the king” (the father), and herself.

This style may seem to cast the daughter back into the dependent role of “Daddy’s Little Girl.” However, daughters who represent the style of “caretaker of the King’s Gold,” have found their identity through interdependence with their fathers. While sons cannot feel like men until they break away from Dad, daughters mature through affiliation and interconnectedness. Fathers with this type of daughter find that they can gradually phase out of the business. Their daughter is capable of running the business with out them, but she also values working with her father for as long as he is capable.

Murray Bowen, a family systems psychiatrist has suggested that interdependence is one sign of a healthy family. Certainly this is no less true for a family firm. Fathers and daughters who are able to be respectful of each other, nurture each others developmental needs and both creatively pursue the business are in a better position to make a healthy transition from father to daughter when the time comes for the succession of leadership.

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Beat divorce statistics: Communicate as mate, not business partner

By Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S.

I got a call this week from a journalist (Business Week) wanting information on entrepreneurial couples who face divorce. When journalists call for an interview I get a queasy feeling in my stomach. I’m not worried about a Sixty- Minutes-Expose where I’ll say something so embarrassing that the whole nation will think I’m ignorant. My concern is that there are the inevitable questions about statistics. As we all know statistics are often about as confusing and useful as software manuals written by Korean engineers and translated into English.

It’s not that I can’t reel off statistics with the best of them. I am a researcher after all. I have graduate degrees . . . two of them! But when it comes to statistics about families in business, or entrepreneurial couples, the numbers are thin. The SBA does not keep statistics on these populations. The National Association for Women Business Owners reports on women-owned businesses, but not on couple-owned businesses. The most fascinating thing about this lack of information is that it is estimated that over half of the gross national product comes from family owned firms and half of American works in them! So where are the numbers?

To make matters worse this particular journalist wanted statistics on divorce rates among entrepreneurial couples. Further she wanted to know the statistics on those couples who get divorced and still choose to stay business partners. This is a pretty narrow segment of the population. As exasperating as these requests are for statistics (i.e., I get requests for such interviews about once a month) what this tells me is that there is a rapidly growing interest in the subject. Not just the media, but the public wants to know more about entrepreneurial couples . . . how they do it, how they survive it, how they prosper, how they keep love alive in the fast-paced cutthroat world of the national/international marketplace.

If you also want statistics, I will disappoint you too. I just don’t know how many entrepreneurial couples out there get divorced or avoid divorce. However, I can confidently tell how to manage it either way.

First, if your marriage/business partnership has already disintegrated to the point of divorce and you really feel there is no turning back, seek the advice of a competent matrimonial attorney. Your business attorney cannot help you here. A marriage is unlike any other business contract you have entered. Most sophisticated business people are shocked to discover the entanglements created by being married and business partners. Your matrimonial lawyer will help with the marital and business division. But it will be costly and take more time than you could possibly conceive; certainly more time than it took to sign your marriage license at the courthouse.

But let’s assume that things have not gone this far awry. In fact, let’s assume that you two are happily married and the business is thriving and you would just like to prevent trouble. Simply, the best insurance against divorce is to attend to the relationship first, the business second. Sadly, the opposite seems to be what most entrepreneurial couples do. The pull of the business is strong, immediate and concrete. The pull of the marriage is strong too, but not as immediate and certainly fuzzy. Because it is easier to react and answer the phone call rather than remember to say something loving to one’s spouse, the typical entrepreneur opts for responding to business needs first. But the truth is it is pretty simple to maintain a relationship and much more complicated to run a business, so it seems the average entrepreneur could work both into their hectic schedule.

Business is about competition and marriage is about love. In business the goal is to compete, to win, to make a profit. In marriage there is no goal, but rather a process . . . that of exchanging love. Being loving and receiving love are the basics of a healthy marriage. How much work is love anyway? How much effort is there in telling your spouse he or she is loved? How hard is it to carve out one night a month to go on a date? Is it such an extravagance to bring home flowers for your sweetheart or treat him or her to basketball tickets? Along with all of the other e-mails you respond to each day, would it take so much of your precious work time to send an e-mail of appreciation to your spouse too?

It’s not that entrepreneurial couples don’t have time for their loved ones. It’s that the goal orientation of the business takes over. Always in the competitive mode from dawn to dusk, the entrepreneur ticks one item after another off of their daily agenda. Being loving is not on the list. Accomplishment is. In business the point of any conversation is the bottom line or the close. In a marriage the point of the conversation is rapport, staying emotionally connected with one another, or feeling loved. When there are not only one but two entrepreneurs in the marriage, such as with entrepreneurial couples, the focus can be so much on the business, and on the business mode of communication, that love is left in the dust as the couple races to out distance their competition and create financial independence. With this approach, however, they also risk total independence from each other as well. One day there may be statistics on the number of entrepreneurial couples who end their marriages. But if you don’t want to be one of those divorce statistics then immediately implement this simple plan. Put the marriage first by doing one loving thing each day for your spouse. You can do battle and conquer all day long in the business world, but at the end of your day, switch modes and have a conversation about nothing at all with your spouse. Don’t search for the bottom line. Don’t anticipate the close. Instead hold her hand, look into his eyes, talk a little, and congratulate yourself on how lucky you are to have a business partner who is the love of your life.


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Master the art of listening to overcome your communication problems


By Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S.

One of the first things that most people ask a psychologist is for help communicating. Jimmy and Brent were no different. Jimmy wanted help developing a succession plan so that one day he could turn his profitable business over to his son Brent when Jimmy was ready to retire. Retirement was about ten years away so there was plenty of time to develop the plan and begin training the successor. The only problem was that the communication between father and son was atrocious.

Jimmy as a sole proprietor had run his business very successfully for many years. He had built it from the ground up with little help from anyone, bankers or friends. He and his wife raised their three children while growing the business. Two children were off working elsewhere and with no desire to come into the family business. Although they had worked summers and after school for Dad, they determined in college that their interests were elsewhere. The middle child Brent, however, worked steadily for Jimmy over the years. He never worked elsewhere in fact and was now identified as the successor.

The communication problems surfaced as the succession planning evolved. Brent had an employee mentality and seemed unaware that he needed to begin demonstrating leadership skills. Afterall, he had never had management responsibility until now, so was unaccustomed to it. In the course of training him to run the business Jimmy began turning over projects to Brent. However, Brent waited for guidance from Jimmy and never completed the projects. This infuriated Jimmy who lashed out at Brent. Brent withdrew and did even less work. Jimmy started making lists for Brent. And it went on like this until the two were thoroughly alienated.

To unscramble a communication mess like this it was necessary for Jimmy and Brent to begin listening to each other in a new way. Communication is more about listening than it is about talking. And communication is mostly about listening to the real meaning intended behind the words being spoken or written. For example, when my daughter Bianca was just three, she looked up at me with a very serious expression on her little face and said, “My neck is tight.”

Three-year-olds have limited life experience and an even more limited expressive vocabulary. Taking this into consideration I wondered if she was trying to tell me something but was using words in a way unfamiliar to me. Further, she was coming to me with her problem, so she must have thought telling me this would be of some help to her or me. Third, I asked myself how it might feel if my neck were tight. Then the light bulb went off. I asked her if her neck was tight on the inside and she nodded an affirmative. So I explained that we called that feeling a “sore throat,” and I gave her something to soothe the irritation.

There are a few simple tips you can begin practicing immediately to clear up communication problems you are having with your loved ones, employees, friends and business associates. First, listen for what the other person means not just what they are saying. Bianca was trying to tell me she had a sore throat and that she wanted help. Brent through his actions was demonstrating that he didn’t understand what leadership means. Jimmy can’t assume that Brent will catch on quickly if he has never had the opportunity to learn or practice this skill.

A second tip is to ask yourself “Why is he or she telling me this?” When people communicate they unconsciously and many times consciously identify a certain person to talk with. The person is chosen because the speaker needs a certain kind of feedback that they hope they will get from the person. My daughter Bianca chose to tell me about her sore throat because I am her mother and a person likely to care and to help her. Jimmy chose Brent to be his successor because they are father and son. Jimmy’s impatience with his son is because he expects Brent to understand him better than others and because he is the heir to the business. Jimmy cares about his son, not just the business. He wants his son to succeed, so he pushes.

Third, assume that the person has a very good reason for telling you their story. It is often easy to dismiss another person when they don’t make sense to you or perhaps are talking about something uninteresting. Often the only reason for talking is to connect with another person. If the other person is telling you something you already know, or sharing a tidbit of local gossip, or asking you questions about yourself, it is quite possible they are “just making conversation.” But this is no small thing. There is nothing small about “small talk.” It is a quick way to build rapport and trust between people. Often in our busy lives we skip the small talk and get on with the agenda.

Jimmy and Brent were more successful with their communication when they realized that at work they had seldom engaged in small talk. In the past, Brent had quickly learned to do his assignments and not interrupt his busy father. Thus when Jimmy began turning over important projects requiring more communication of an executive nature, Brent didn’t know what to do. He expected his father to give him an assignment, not ask for his opinion. When the two started to talk as peers, to engage in chitchat, Brent began to understand that his opinions mattered. He began to engage in more creative thinking which eventually lead to developing his innate leadership abilities.

Communicating is an art. It is a complex never ending process that requires your attention. If you assume because you are in the same family, or because you work in the same industry, or because you are both native English speakers, that understanding each other is simple, you will create confusion over and over again. On the other hand, if you try these three tips . . . listening for the meaning, noticing why the speaker chose you, and accepting the meaningfulness of all communication no matter how small . . . not only will your communication effectiveness grow, but your relationships will improve too. Doesn’t it feel good to be understood? Try giving that to others.

Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S., Licensed Psychologist and Family/Business Consultant is the author of ENTREPRENEURIAL COUPLES: Making It Work at Work and at Home (Davies-Black, 1998). She can be reached at (360) 256-0448 or www.kmarshack.com. Look for her new website especially for entrepreneurs www.executivecouples.com.

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Keeping secrets in your family or business creates a tangled web

By Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S.

“It’ll just make things worse if I tell him.”

Janice was getting more and more anxious as the days and weeks went by. The bills were mounting, the creditors were calling, the first bank note was due in one month, and sales were miserable. Janice and her husband had just begun a business expansion that they had dreamed and planned for over the last five years. They were positive it was a winner and were thrilled when the bank backed them up. While Cary blazed ahead with building, hiring, warehousing and so forth, Janice as CFO handled the creative financing.

Unfortunately Janice was just a little too creative with the financing. Because the dream was too important she stretched things further than they could be stretched. Cary never questioned his wife and was unaware that they were heading for financial disaster. Janice on the other hand kept trying to pull a rabbit out of the hat.

When Janice first discovered her miscalculations, she was mortified. She was too embarrassed to tell Cary, so instead tried to solve the problem on her own. As the financial problems increased, she started shifting money from one account to another, staying one step ahead of her creditors. She convinced herself that Cary was too busy with the project to be bothered by the financial problems. She rationalized that these problems were temporary because any day now she would find a solution. Janice loved her husband and didn’t want to disappoint him either. She felt he would be crushed to discover that not only would he have to halt the expansion, but that the entire business might go under. So she lied and she hid the truth in a variety of ways.

Since Cary was not very computer literate and left all of the number crunching to his wife, the secret was not hard to keep. Until of course, the bank called the loan. Then Cary and Janice had two problems to face. The financial woes were their immediate focus so as business partners they busied themselves untangling the mess that Janice had concealed. But as the dust settled from the financial nightmare, husband and wife had a to face a more serious crisis . . . how to restore the broken trust between them.

“What they don’t know won’t hurt them.”

Even a surprise birthday party may be a secret not worth keeping, if the guest of honor doesn’t like them. It is rare that secrets are a good idea and yet they are commonplace in family firms. The major reasons for keeping secrets are (1) to avoid disagreement and confrontation, (2) to protect someone from hurt feelings or even physical distress, (3) fear of punishment or embarassment for a wrong doing, (4) or just because you made a promise not to tell.

Why are secrets so bad if they don’t hurt anyone? This is usually a rationalization. If you have to keep a secret, then it obviously affects other people. The content of the secret may or may not affect the other person adversely, but the question is, will keeping the secret affect the other person adversely? As we saw with Janice and Cary both the secret and keeping it powerfully affected the business and the relationship. There is no telling whether the couple could have saved their business had Cary known earlier of the miscalculations. However, by keeping the secret long after she should have told Cary, Janice seriously damaged the trust and the love between the two.

“But he’ll get mad at me if I tell him the truth!”

No one likes an argument but it is foolish to think that you can go through life, build a marriage and a business without having disagreements. As compatible as family members may be, they are bound to disagree on some things and sometimes these disagreements escalate into angry confrontations. Therefore it is useful to develop conflict resolution skills, rather than avoid the anger.

The excuse that the other person will get mad if you level with him or her is a poor one. First, you never know if he or she will get mad. Second, even if he or she does get mad, the discussion doesn’t have to end. Be brave and venture into conflict resolution. Third, the person may have every right to be upset that you withheld information (or fibbed) that affects his or her life. Think about it. How do you feel when a secret is kept from you, especially if your decisions depend upon the hidden information?

“It would be mean to be honest.”

There is often the fear that you will hurt someone’s feelings if you tell the truth, or worse that they will have a heart attack and die. The problem is that you have no right to assume responsibility for the other person’s life or life decisions. When you keep a secret that affects the life of another, you are robbing them of the opportunity to take responsibility for their own destiny. Because Janice loved her husband, she wanted to insure the success of his dream. But by lying to Cary, she kept him ignorant of the information he needed to make a mid-course correction. He may still have failed had he known earlier what the financial picture looked like, but the success of the business and his own destiny would have been in his hands.

Essentially it is disrespectful to keep secrets. You are treating the other person as if they are incompetent to handle the truth. What makes you better able to handle the truth than the other person? Sometimes the truth hurts. Sometimes it is embarrassing. Sometimes the truth is a powerful leveler without which you would never know you are in over your head. When I received the phone call telling me that my ten-year-old daughter had just missed the cut for the soccer team, I had to tell her the truth. Not only had she failed to make the team, but that she wasn’t quite good enough to play with this team. She cried and sobbed and was heartbroken over the failure. She even refused to eat dinner and went to bed early. However, the next day she obviously had learned an important lesson. She asked for new shinguards and went to the backyard to practice for next year’s tryouts.

“I won’t tell you unless you promise to keep it a secret.”

Signs of maturity are honesty and reliability. When we give our word, we feel a strong compulsion to keep it, to be consistent with our image of an honest and reliable person. However, it is important to realize that promising to keep a secret is not a demonstration of maturity, but actually quite childish. As a businessperson, your success depends upon flexibility. Decisions made in 1982, while accurate at the time may no longer fit the business in the year 2000. You would be foolish to hold to old decisions just because you once made a promise. You are just as foolish to keep a secret just because you want to maintain an image of consistency.

Emerson once wrote, “foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” To make a promise to keep a secret in the first place is foolish, but you double your foolishness by keeping the secret when the evidence shows how damaging it can be. To cover for an alcoholic in the family business brings destruction on everyone. To withhold information from your spouse because one of the children has asked you is disrespectful of your spouse and the child’s ability to handle the problem out in the open.

Oh what a tangled web we weave . . .

There may be short-term gain in keeping secrets, but the long-term outcome is not worth the risk, especially when working with the ones you love. Openness in all things is the answer, even if it is embarrassing, anger-provoking, or hurtful. Don’t keep secrets, but if you already have, break them. Admit your failure, apologize to those you have lied to and make a promise you can live with. That is, promise to be responsible for your own actions, and allow others access to their own destiny through the truth.

Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S. Licensed Psychologist and Family/Business Consultant is the author of ENTREPRENEUERIAL COUPLES: Making It Work at Work and at Home (Davies-Black, Palo Alto, 1998). She can be reached at (360) 256-0448 or www.kmarshack.com.

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Are You An Entrepreneur?


By Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S.

Oddly this question came to me while I was attending a conference on entrepreneurship and small business in San Antonio in February. The reason this is odd is that there were few entrepreneurs in the audience. Instead the attendees were professors of business schools from across the country. These are the professors at prestigious business schools such as Harvard, the University of Michigan, Stanford, and UCLA that teach courses on business, marketing and management. They even teach courses on entrepreneurship, but most of these professors don’t own their own enterprise. They study entrepreneurs. They develop theory about entrepreneurs. They even teach courses for entrepreneurs, but they don’t “walk the talk.”

Until fairly recently entrepreneurship has not even been a topic of conversation in the nation’s top business schools, for the simple reason that business schools are primarily about training professional managers and future professors. The graduate students from these schools go on to work in corporate America, working their way up the career ladder, hoping to reach the presidency some day, or at least earn a key to the executive washroom. It’s not that these professional managers are not talented, nor that they lack leadership qualities. They are creative and innovative too. However, they are not entrepreneurs.

If you are an entrepreneur, or are married to one, or know one personally, chances are the entrepreneur did not go to business school. Or if they did, they dropped out (i.e. Bill Gates) when they learned that business school was not going to open the doors of opportunity. A few entrepreneurs managed to stay to graduation, but they were probably bored out of their minds, just biding their time until they could do what they really wanted to do. My brother-in-law Rick is like this. To please his father, he went to law school, even joined a law firm after graduation. However, soon he realized that he was too restless to work for anyone else. Before he turned 30, he was heading up his own firm and well close to achieving his dream of being a multi-millionaire.

True entrepreneurs don’t come from business schools. They come from engineering, medicine, anthropology, the arts (all of them), psychology, computer sciences. They are liberal arts majors, history majors, athletes, general studies majors, high school graduates, even high school dropouts. They come from all walks of life and have as varied life experiences as is humanly possible. This is why the entrepreneur has been so hard to define. You just can’t fit them into a category. Psychologists have been trying to do this for years, but there is no reliable personality test for the traits of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurs aren’t a type of person. They are people who are entrepreneurial.

The closest I can come to defining the entrepreneur is that this person has vision. They are able to see the big picture like no one else. And they are determined to accomplish their vision. In other words they are extremely hardworking and tenacious. They are no more intelligent than others; no more creative either. But this vision is a special gift that puts the entrepreneur light years ahead of the ordinary person. With vision the entrepreneur is able to see opportunity before others.

Even more important than vision is purpose. The vision is a like a bright beacon that guides the entrepreneur toward his or her goals. However, to determine those goals in the first place, the entrepreneur has to have purpose. Most entrepreneurs will tell you that they “just had to do it.” They have known what they were about since they were children. Their purpose is not always clearly defined in a business plan, but they have been pursuing it nevertheless. The successful entrepreneur is true to his or her purpose for a lifetime, regardless of the enterprise they engage in.

One local entrepreneur loved to build things as a little boy. He went on to get a degree in engineering and eventually started a manufacturing plant. But his purpose is deeper than that. He doesn’t just like to build things; he has to. And he doesn’t just like to build things; he has to contribute to the community. Although this man is an engineer by education and training, he is really a builder of ideas.

Not all entrepreneurs are millionaires either. Another local entrepreneur is a minister and artist. Since she was a little girl she loved to draw and paint and sculpt. She never really fit into the mainstream, but she always blamed it on her dysfunctional family. Now she realizes that she was preparing herself to carry out an important purpose in life. Through art (her own and that of those she counsels) she helps people discover their spiritual mission.

The saving grace of the conference was the noon keynote speaker on Friday, Marjorie Alfus. I was so inspired by Marjorie’s speech, that I jumped to my feet after her talk and started a standing ovation. At 78 years of age, Marjorie epitomizes the American Entrepreneur. Although she has made her wealth and could retire, she can’t stand being bored. She is taking her twentieth century entrepreneurial experiences and translating them into the twenty-first century, by creating a web business. Marjorie made her wealth by outsourcing and just-in-time inventory, when other twentieth century entrepreneurs were putting their money into brick and mortar. Now she can use that good common sense to succeed at her new venture, www.golfgizmos.com. With a modem, fax and world wide merchandising contacts, Marjorie will probably clean up.

If you don’t have a knack for vision or you are not sure of your purpose, take heart. You may still be an entrepreneur who is holding back. It takes a lot of courage to follow your heart and create a dream that no one else can see or support. All entrepreneurs have one more thing in common. Before they are successful, no one really understands them, but with success they are much appreciated.

Kathy J. Marshack, Ph.D., P.S., Licensed Psychologist and Family/Business Consultant is the author of ENTREPRENEURIAL COUPLES: Making It Work at Work and at Home (1998, Davies-Black). She can be reached at (360) 256-0448 or www.kmarshack.com.

If you have a loved one on the Spectrum, please check our private MeetUp group. We have members from around the world meeting online in intimate video conferences guided by Dr. Kathy Marshack.
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