AD ALTA
JOURNAL OF INTERDISCIPLINARY RESEARCH
3.1 LIKO-S International - Even if you plan it hard, to hand
over your company to the children is alchemy
The company is a family firm with more than 22 years of
experience. It has the exact structure and the proper functioning
of the all organs of the joint-stock company. It manufactures and
assembles interior walls, mobile walls, acoustic ceilings and in-
buildings to halls. It welds, cuts, and assembles metal structures
and technological systems. It employs more than 150 employees
and it has branches in Prague, in Central Europe, and in far
India. Family Business of the Year - winner, 2014.
According to Libor Musil - founder and CEO - it is up to parents
to hand over the company to children in the structure that will
meet the requirements of the new occupancy. They must
transform it to meet the requirements of the children, not the
founders. He implements the transition to a holding structure in
order to prevent the possible consequences of the mistakes of his
successors, to ensure the safety of sources, and to demonstrate
the responsibility towards both employees and suppliers.
Son Jan Musil began to work in the company after returning
from the secondary school in England. He is proud of what his
parents managed to build and also feels responsible towards
employees. He began working as an assistant in the sales
department, then as an independent sales representative for
northwest Bohemia. He "popped in" to the production as a
manager for half a year. This was followed by the practice on the
Austrian market. He has been working as the head of export in
the division of interiors last year and he is also responsible for
marketing and product development. He operates with a
relatively large budget.
Daughter Hanka is five years older than Jan. She returned after
several years working in the US with her husband who is from
Jamaica and who ran the hotel in Florida with about 2500
employees. The daughter goes through various divisions, gets
familiar with the operation, and now she shades her mother, who
is responsible for human resources management in the company.
Hanka learns to conduct the job interviews, to assess people's
personal characteristics, to interact with managers, and to solve
problems within the team. Her husband is the logical answer for
the American market - currently, he mainly focuses on learning
Czech.
At what stage the imaginary generational passing of the
sceptre is? "Children" take smaller functions of middle
management to learn. They use the time when they are not yet
fully burdened decision makers to educate themselves as much
as possible. However, we gradually move the full responsibility
to them. They should go through the "trial and error" stage as
soon as possible because no textbook can simulate the position
of the company owner. Father-founder acknowledges that the
arrival of the children in the company lifted its quality. It was
not only the matter of a different view, but it was also important
to learn to communicate better, to adjust the solution to every
problem because even the smallest inconsistency jumps into the
family life. The whole family plans, mutually develops, and
learns together, so the undertaking is fulfilling and enjoyable.
(Musil, 2015)
3.2 Renocar
The Renocar Company is one of the leading dealers of BMW
and MINI as well as service providers for BMW, MINI, Opel
and Chevrolet. Renocar was founded on September 22, 1990 as
one of the first private companies in the former Czechoslovakia.
It was founded by Mr. Miloš Vránek, Sr. The roots of the
company, however, can be traced back to the sixties. While
Pavel has been doing business with his father from the
beginning, his brother Miloš did not push himself into the family
business. He studied medicine, specializing in neurology. He
was interested in acupuncture and alternative medicine. And he
was successful. He had his own private practice for roughly a
decade. About fifteen years ago, Miloš Vránek Sr. and his son
Pavel stood before the decision whether to expand the company
or not. At that moment, Miloš took off his medical coat and
jumped into the well started family business. At that time,
according to the father-founder of the company, it got to the
point where he could not manage it intuitively and base his
decisions just on his life experiences. "The different way of
managing and leading had to come and the guys today lead the
company in a totally different way than how I did it myself,"
says the father, adding that the key to success is the conferral of
trust.
He formally gave it to his sons in 2013. All three of them speak
about the transfer of the company as about a perfectly natural
thing which happened gradually. The enterprise has undergone
an unassisted change . Miloš Vránek gave his confidence not
only to his sons, but also to managers. "Sons understand that to
spend ten or twelve hours in the company every day does not
make any sense," he explains the reasons why the company
employs hired managers on major management positions.
Renocar company currently employs about 160 people in full-
time job and it accepts students for internships. "We cannot
manage everything just me and my brother and so we started to
build a layer of middle management," says Pavel. It took the
company eight years to grow into its present form. Even though
only siblings lead it today, they go to their father for advice
sometimes. "We solve the moderately important things alone
with Miloš, but for those crucial ones it is good to have three
heads," says Miloš Jr. and he adds that the family respects all the
decisions even if one of the members does not agree with the
outcome. "Emotions do not bother us and suddenly it paid off to
follow the feeling in the stomach," says Pavel.
When Miloš Vránek started his business, he was more than forty
years old. Today, his two sons are in the same age, while their
children are in puberty. "It's good for our young to have a part
time job in our company, but both me and my brother think that
it is good to get some experience in another company, to find
self-awareness and then came back with humility," said Miloš
Vránek Jr. and he adds that the company will be led by the
fittest. "Perhaps it might not even be any of our children," says
definitely Miloš Vránek Jr. (Adamcová, 2015)
4. Discussion
According to Silke Horáková, co-owner of Albatros Media, it is
clear that the focus of the family businesses on the long-term
goals is one of the rudiments of their success. Above all, it is the
result of the stable ownership and the commitment to the future
owners of the company. As well as the other businesses, family
businesses are exposed to the challenges of talent development
and of the management of human resources through
management and knowledge transfer. However, in their case
it is closely connected with the question of the succession in the
leadership of the company. It depends on the specific
circumstances whether the best talents are developed inside the
family, or they are (also) found outside. In modern families the
"forced" succession have been mostly eliminated and talent and
motivation are crucial for family members. We continuously
educate our children as responsible people and maybe they will
once become responsible owners too.
As it comes from the traditions of the First Republic, the
common affair for the children from entrepreneurial families was
to leave to a free employment abroad not only to extend
knowledge in the relevant profession, but also to acquire some
more general overview of the business (Skácel, 2014) -
Nowadays, each of the potential ascendants should receive
appropriate education and a foreign internship. It is
necessary to clarify which skills should successor meet, to set a
personal development plan for the representatives of the
rising generation - i.e. the list of skills and experiences that are
necessary for the son or the daughter in order to acquire the
company. The plan should also contain the outline of the specific
steps which would lead to the acquisition.
As the great gift we can consider the situation when the children
join the family business and when they want to continue in what
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