Jan Sten

Transfers of Family Businesses to Non-family Buyers: the Selling Business Family Perspective Jan Sten

A business transfer is a great challenge for a selling business family. The business may have been owned and managed for generations by the same family, and it is not easy to be the generation to end that track record. The selling process may also be long and tricky. It may be full with negotiations about price and other technical details, but the major puzzle is solved on a mental level. A family business transfer will have great influence on the members of the business family who is selling, and therefore it is suggested that personal due diligence could be of some help when planning for the transfer. That tool can help business family members to analyze their own personal situation, but it may also make it easier to understand how the other business family members feel about the forthcoming change. Everyone is influenced in different ways during a family business transfer, and awareness of this fact may make it easier for the whole business family to adjust to their new environment. Special interest is showed for differences between successions and family business transfers to outsiders. Strangers on the other side of the table makes all the difference.