A well-written family business history contains more than important dates, facts and figures. It also interweaves the human-interest stories that make your family’s experience unique. Preserving these stories honors the company’s founders and leaves a legacy for younger generations. Nothing brings a story to life better than a personal anecdote. For example, consider this reminiscence by my client Chuck Samuel of Town Center Properties, El Dorado, Calif.:
My dad always had trouble with one of our tenants, Mike, because he used to get drunk and drink up the rent. Mike was a real tough guy with big, ugly hands, and his face looked like a piece of shoe leather. One day when I was only 12 years old, my dad told me to go to Mike’s apartment and evict him. I was really scared, so before I left I stuck a claw hammer in the back of my pants. I knocked on Mike’s door, and he opened it a crack and looked down at me and said, “What do you want?” I tried to lower my voice at least two octaves. I said, “My dad says you have to leave and I’m supposed to evict you because you have not paid your rent. You’re supposed to leave right away.” So Mike said, “OK.” He had his suitcase ready to go, and he just walked out. It never occurred to me until years later that my dad had arranged the whole thing and was just testing me. But it worked! I was so proud of myself after that.
In telling his own story, Samuel conveys his personality. His memories enable his children to identify with their father as a young boy whose confidence was not always there—it had to be developed.
Personal anecdotes capture the vision of the founders, explain changes in the company over the years and communicate wishes for the future. They also can help clarify family values in language everyone can understand. When my client Richard Backer, owner of East Side Prescription Center in Providence, R.I., describes an early lesson he learned from his father, he shows his children the roots of their family’s work ethic:
My father was a teenager when he immigrated to this country in the early 1920s. He had very little education and couldn’t speak English, so he went to work as an unskilled laborer. He eventually started his own business as a “farmer’s supplier”—basically a glorified rubbish man. He had a big truck, and he’d go around to all the markets and sift through all the busted-up, dirty boxes that they would throw out: apple boxes, cabbage crates, chicken boxes. Then he’d sell the boxes to the farmers. It was hard work from dawn to dusk, but it instilled a strong work ethic in my brothers and me. It taught us that if you wanted to get ahead, you had to work hard.
Telling the story of their company in their own words helps family business owners to bridge the generation gap. Another client, Barry Slatt, president of Barry S. Slatt Mortgage Company in Burlingame, Calif., discusses ethical principles that he hopes will continue in his company:
I believe ethics and trust are the most important things in life. If you commit to something, you have to follow through with it. I tell my children to always be truthful. In our business you have to tell people all the facts, good and bad. If you commit to somebody and you lose money, so be it. That’s part of life. You have to stand behind your word.
Keeping your word, working hard, standing up for yourself—these are just a few of the concepts that have sustained successful family businesses. What’s your family’s story?
Mandy Syers, a personal historian, is the founder of Heirloom Books, based in Providence, R.I. (www.heirloom-books.com). She is a member of the Association of Personal Historians.