In most family businesses, conflict is described as a disagreement over money, roles, or documents. That description is convenient, because it keeps the problem outside the self. The deeper truth is more unsettling. Conflict begins when the family loses the ability to hold otherness within clear and respected limits. Otherness does not mean hostility. It means that the person across the table inhabits a different inner logic. A different sense of risk. A different relationshi

Power, Order, and the Return of History For the longest time, the powers that once shaped the world chose comfort over consequence. After the Second World War, and even more decisively after decolonisation, they abandoned not only territory, but responsibility itself. Authority was replaced by procedure. Sovereignty by treaties. Power by vocabulary. The architecture of international law became a moral language rather than an instrument of order. What followed was not peace. I

Let us state it clearly. 2026 must be the year of governance. Too much damage occurred in 2025. Families did not fail because they lacked intelligence, capital, or good intentions. They failed because they were misled into taking shortcuts. They trusted advisors who confused busy activity with true expertise, and standard templates with wise decisions. They were told that speed meant sophistication. That documents could replace real conversations. That simply following rules

Where Family Wealth Meets Continuity A few months ago, we shared the idea of the Legacy Hub, created in partnership with CdR Capital. It grew from a simple intention: to offer families in business a safe place to slow down, step back from urgency, and reconnect with what truly matters across governance and capital. Today, the Legacy Hub comes to life. A new year brings space for reflection, and also the energy to begin anew. The Legacy Hub reflects a gentle shift in how famil

As the year turns, there is reason to feel grateful. For the small things that help us through the day. For the people who stand beside us, often quietly. For the simple relief of seeing things a little more clearly. Nothing important is ever fully secured. Peace, trust, and harmony. They live through care, patience, and attention. They grow when we choose kindness over noise, and presence over performance. I hope the months ahead bring you warmth and steadiness. Moments that

In many family enterprises, continuity is often imagined as a single road. A path chosen early, reinforced by habit, expectation, and the quiet weight of tradition. Yet legacy is not meant to confine. It is meant to offer space. A family does not endure because every generation repeats the previous one. It endures because each generation brings something true. Choosing a different direction is not a rejection of the family story. It is a recognition of one’s own centre. The y

Every family enterprise carries its own version of “read my lips.” A vow once spoken, never sell the land, never dilute control, never bring in outsiders, becomes the moral currency of belonging. It defines trust and identity, binding generations to a common story. Yet, as in politics, such pledges can turn from anchors into burdens. The Financial Times this weekend recalls how George HW Bush’s fateful promise, “Read my lips: no new taxes,” secured victory, only to undo him w

Every family enterprise carries a pulse, the quiet rhythm that unites generations through effort, memory, and hope. It is not the heartbeat of money or performance, but of meaning. Families that last learn to listen to this rhythm, to sense when it quickens, when it falters, and when it needs air to breathe again. Time, in such families, is not something to manage but something to inhabit. It moves through the stories they tell, the choices they defend, the silences they shar

Trust is not a designation one assumes, nor a reputation one declares. It is a verdict, rendered by others over time, often in silence, and only after conduct has been observed when it mattered, when pressure was real, and when easier paths were available. What distinguishes a trusted advisor is not what he knows, but how he holds what others entrust to him. Families and leaders do not merely share information. They place in his hands uncertainty, fear, pride, fatigue, and un

In a world shaped by disposable habits and replaceable things, repair has gradually come to be regarded as an inconvenience. For many years, when families in business encountered conflict, responses followed familiar paths. Courts were engaged, authorities invited to intervene, assets divided. These measures sometimes restored calm, but rarely coherence. What was deferred often returned, particularly after the passing of the family anchor, when memory softened and positions h

“A home for my tribe.” The title of the weekend Financial Times article lingers long after the page is turned. This unease has been with me for some time, and I use this article to question what it reveals beneath its surface. Not only about technology or governance, but about ourselves, and about what we seem increasingly willing to abandon in the pursuit of alignment, comfort, and control. My generation was raised when grand causes inflamed societies. Ideas mobilised masses

On December 13, 2025, The Wall Street Journal described a phenomenon that unsettles precisely because it remains legal. Lawyers act correctly. Fertility clinics follow protocol. Intermediaries coordinate efficiently. Courts apply existing rules. Nothing breaks. And yet something essential recedes. The article does not reveal a scandal. It reveals a void, a space where ethics once operated, now replaced by procedure. At its core, the story forces a question modern societies ha

Across the world, founder-led empires are discovering a painful truth. Legal architecture cannot repair what human architecture has never built. Yesterday’s Financial Times account of the Solorz succession battle in Poland, arriving so soon after the Murdoch saga where a father bought out his own children to unwind an arrangement he once believed would secure harmony, reveals a global pattern. Structures are polished, advisers many, documents impeccable, yet families walk int

In a family enterprise, every decision carries a silent question: how shall we live together. A majority vote may offer a quick answer, yet it does so by dividing the room. It settles the issue, but unsettles the bond. Arithmetic produces winners and losers. Leadership cannot. A family is not preserved by triumph. It is preserved by the dignity each person feels within it. With experience, one discovers that disagreement is not what weakens a family. The real danger lies in t

Yesterday’s FT report on the dialogue between PepsiCo and Elliott reminded the world that activism, when practised with discipline and respect, can restore clarity to institutions that have drifted from their purpose. Faced with mounting complexity and eroding margins, PepsiCo agreed to simplify its architecture, rethink its product universe, and refresh its board. None of this was an act of surrender. It was a recognition that an external voice had seen what internal governa

When people find themselves in deadlock, what blocks them is rarely the issue itself; it is perception. Each side looks at the same reality and sees a different truth. Each believes the other has misunderstood, exaggerated, or betrayed something essential. In those moments, conflict becomes a mirror: what we see in the other is often what we cannot yet see in ourselves. Deadlock feels suffocating because perception hardens into conviction. We stop hearing words and start defe

In many family enterprises, the first warning sign is not a crisis in the numbers. It is the moment when those who carry responsibility come home empty. They have spoken all day, yet have no words left. They have taken decisions, yet have no energy for a simple conversation. Children receive brief answers. Partners meet a distant gaze. Slowly, fatigue replaces presence, and the home becomes an extension of the office rather than a place of rest. A family that lives in this co

There is no wound deeper than the one inflicted within a family. In business, as in life, strangers can betray you, but only blood can unmake you. When conflict crosses a certain line, something irreversible begins. Familiar faces harden into adversaries. Names become weapons. What once was shared becomes territory to defend. Words are no longer bridges; they are blades. At that point, to de-blood is not an act of choice, it is a slow erosion of recognition. Families in busin

Last friday's ’s Financial Times feature on Fidelity and the family behind it offered more than a corporate chronicle. It revealed the quiet resilience of a dynasty that has endured for nearly eight decades, reminding us that longevity in business is not a product of luck or management theory, but of fidelity in its purest sense: faithfulness to purpose, to principle, and to one another. Much has been written about how families endure: growth, talent, unity, governance. These

Throughout my life’s journey, I have had the privilege of crossing paths with leaders of many kinds. Some radiated calm authority, others embodied restless ambition. Some led through conviction and clarity, others through will and command. Each revealed, in their own way, that leadership is not a posture but a presence. It is the invisible rhythm that orders a group, the quiet force that influences how others think, decide, and aspire when the leader is no longer in the room.