W
hy is it that wealth in Africa
rarely transcends generations?
I was recently told of a
gentleman who in the eighties had so
much money and among his businesses
was a shipping line. When he died, not
only did all the businesses collapse, the
sea reclaimed every single one of the ships
and they all sank after years of being idle.
It doesn’t matter how much money these
people had. From multi-millionaires to
millionaires, they all suffered the same
fate when they died. Everything became
a shadow of what it was in their lifetime.
Why do businesses fizzle away with their
founders?
There are three elements which I have
called The Founders Syndrome and this
time we want to examine these elements.
There may be other factors but the three
that I have found that seem to be at
the root of this problem are Emotions,
Insecurity, and Structure.
their companies in their own lifetime. business to completely new heights.
Every business success is the product of a
process - a journey that was many times
a very rigorous journey laden with threats
and uncertainties. For a person who has
successfully navigated their business to
the point of success and admiration they
will need a deep understanding to be able
to let go. Marshall Goldsmith in the book What
Got You Here Won't Get You There also
identifies the need for new thinking. This
new thinking sometimes does not need
a new person but a time comes when an
organization needs fresh blood to keep it
fresh. Sometimes when people who have
been used to the old way of doing the
business get into leadership, the future
is never too different from the past. For
transformation to happen however, new
thinking must produce new ideas.
One of the best books I have read that can
help a founder to disengage is a book titled
Making Money Is Killing Your Business
by Chuck Blakeman. His argument is
based on a simple premise that you need
to view your business like you will view a
child. At one stage you nurture the child
and take care of it. That however is not
a permanent state. You need to groom
the child to become independent of you.
If at the point when the child ought to
be independent of you, they are still
dependent on you, then there is a problem.
The Emotional Entrapment The Same Suffice With The
Business.
Most founders went through a very tough
journey to get to their horizons. They
hustled and failed and hustled again and
failed and many times their success was
the finish line and the end of a long string
of failures.
I remember when I started out and how
I had to hawk books at the park. These
were not books that I wrote. They were
other people’s books and the chances of
my family eating that day was dependent
on how many books I was able to sell.
When you have gone through this and
you finally get out of that rut, it builds a
strong sentimental attachment to the past
and that sentimental attachment can be
the very thing that causes the business to
fizzle out.
Think of it. I now got to a point where
people were selling books that I had
written. I went to bookstores and found
my books there. I got to airports and saw
my books and before I knew it my books
were everywhere. I remember a day when
I was on a flight and midair the pilot came
out with one of my books asking for my
autograph.
This
sentimental
attachment
and
institutional memory is sometime the
greatest stumbling block for the founder.
When they should be handing over and
having succession programs in place, they
stay on and sadly some of them even kill
In literal terms your goal as a founder
should be to work yourself out of the
business and this can only happen when
you know from the beginning that a day
will come when others will take your
dream to the next level.
Blakeman said that if you want a mature
business that you can enjoy for decades
and that makes money while you are on
vacation you might need a new view of
business to get there. This is very true. The
thinking that starts a business and grows
it to a certain level must invariably give
way to a new thinking that will take the
I remember working for an organization
where they discovered that the young
people loved to listen to music as they
worked and so they decided to pipe
music across the office. There was only
one problem. The people making the
decision listened to Jim Reeves and old
school country music while the people
they were doing it for listened to Beyonce.
Sometimes, fresh thinking does need fresh
bodies.
The fact that people have accidents in
cars does not stop us from driving. Many
people are scared of establishing the right
succession plan in their business because
they are scared that someone will take
advantage of them and swindle them.
There have been thieves and swindlers
forever and they will continue to be there
till the end of time and so this should
not be the excuse why we do not put the
proper structures in place to ensure that
our pet dreams become timeless brands.
For everyone to succeed you must adhere
to the Socratic philosophy that says, ‘Man
know Thyself ’. You must also know that
life is in seasons and phases. The fact that
The ultimate aim of leadership is to train
and raise your replacement. It does take a
level of confidence and security to be able
to do this. As a leader if you are defined by
your position and your identity comes from
the office you hold then you are not in a good
place. The result is that you’ll do everything
to hold on to that office including silencing
and keeping all potential successors at bay.
This trait has been perfected by political of-
fice holders for ages and now it has found its
way into corporate leadership.