The Art of Family Business Coaching
"If you're going to establish a system aimed at spanning generations, you have to be willing to evolve."
- Ennio Mercuri, Managing Director, Ennio International, Australia
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"If you're going to establish a system aimed at spanning generations, you have to be willing to evolve."
Talk with Rene in a
Assisting families and family offices in sustaining a legacy across generations isn’t a science. It’s an art. And like any art, it demands more than technical skill—it requires the courage to face what most governance frameworks ignore: emotion.
After decades working alongside family enterprises—as a confidante, executive, and board member across the Americas, Asia, and Europe—I’ve come to see one truth repeated across cultures and capital structures: it’s not wealth or governance that derails continuity. It’s what’s left unspoken. The rivalries no one names. The grief that never got addressed. The pride quietly competing for control.
Emotions aren’t side issues in family enterprise—they’re central. And yet, most advisors focus on structures, not stories. Strategy, not psychology. The result? Families with impeccable shareholder agreements—and broken relationships.
My coaching practice is designed to go where traditional advisory work often falls short. I work at the intersection of emotional insight and practical governance, helping families confront the silent dynamics that shape their decisions: loyalty, fear, ambition, insecurity, love. I bring both the technical fluency—corporate law, governance, legal structures—and the human lens required to make those tools meaningful.
Effective coaching in this space requires more than just credentials. It calls for someone who can walk into complexity without flinching—someone who understands family systems, team dynamics, succession, and the weight of legacy. Someone who knows when to pause and when to name what’s been avoided for too long.
Because the real work of sustaining a dynasty isn’t in the documents.
A family business is one where ownership and influence rest within a single family—where two or more family members play meaningful roles in shaping the direction of the business through leadership, governance, or the weight of family relationships. It’s not just about who holds the shares, but how ties of blood, legacy, loyalty, and history intersect with business decisions.
To understand the need for family business coaching, you first have to understand the emotional terrain of a family business.
At its best, the family is the company’s greatest asset—loyal, long-term, values-driven, and resilient in the face of adversity. There’s a shared sense of purpose that no corporate mission statement can replicate. Decisions are often made with patience, not just profit in mind. Ownership is stable. There’s pride in legacy and a vision that stretches beyond quarterly results.
But what makes family businesses strong can also make them fragile.
The same closeness that builds loyalty can blur boundaries. Old rivalries resurface. Decisions get entangled with birth order, unspoken expectations, or unresolved conflicts from years ago. A meeting about dividends becomes a proxy for long-standing resentments. Fairness becomes a minefield. Trust is tested. One strained relationship can leak into the entire system.
Family business coaching exists to help families navigate this emotional complexity—not by avoiding it, but by facing it with clarity and intention.
Family business coaching is not therapy, and it’s not consulting. It’s a developmental, forward-looking process designed to help the family—and the business—grow together, without sacrificing one for the other.
At its core, coaching focuses on both systems:
- The family system, with its patterns, loyalties, roles, and emotional history.
- The business system, with its structures, decision-making processes, and strategic goals.
When those systems align, families thrive. When they’re in conflict, even the most successful businesses can fracture.
The process begins quietly, with one-on-one, confidential conversations. These initial interviews aren’t just about gathering facts; they’re about listening deeply. Each family member is invited to share their experience, aspirations, concerns, and unspoken hopes for the future.
Through these conversations, a map begins to form: not just of the business, but of the emotional landscape—where trust exists, where it’s missing, where clarity is needed, and where past dynamics are quietly shaping present decisions.
What follows is a facilitated family conversation—not to fix, but to reflect. This session often sparks questions families rarely ask themselves:
- What does success look like for us, not just financially, but relationally?
- What kind of family do we want to be in 5, 10, or 50 years?
- Where are we strong, and where are we stuck?
From there, a roadmap takes shape. Coaching goals are defined, both individual and collective. The work unfolds in a rhythm of individual coaching, team conversations, and structured family meetings. Progress is tracked not just by metrics, but by tone, trust, and the family’s ability to engage in hard conversations with more openness and less fear.
Depending on the family’s size and complexity, engagements typically last four to twelve months. But the real goal is to build skills and insight that last far beyond that, so that the next tough moment doesn’t need outside help, just a little more courage and a lot more understanding.
With kind regards, René Sonneveld
Packed with actionable insights, The Elephant in the Family Room equips enterprise families with the tools to confront silent threats—unspoken resentments, deep-seated insecurities, lingering fears, and misaligned values—that can quietly erode trust and unity. From power struggles to fractured relationships, this book offers a clear path to bridging generational divides and aligning family and business interests.
Click here to watch the video trailer.
René Sonneveld
2025
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