Family Business: Resilience of family businesses

The Kufstein University of Applied Sciences' bachelor's degree program in Business Management (now: Leadership & Business Management) has been organizing the annual Family Business Day in cooperation with the Weissman Group, a consulting agency for family businesses in Germany, Austria, Italy and Switzerland, since the 2017/18 academic year. This year, the invited experts and entrepreneurs presented interesting facts and best-practice solutions on the topic of resilience in family businesses.

ANTIFRAGILITY VS. RESILIENCE OF FAMILY BUSINESSES

Prof. (FH) Dott. Markus Weishaupt, CEO Managing Director of WeissmannInternational, used various statistics to show how family businesses contribute to the economic development of national economies and the creation of new jobs worldwide. Compared to non-family businesses, listed family businesses have shown a significantly better share performance since 2004. Based on Weishaupt's many years of experience, families can introduce various measures to become antifragile. These include, for example, giving employees freedom and time for creative work, a constructive error culture or intuitively recognizing opportunities in crisis situations. According to his explanations, the term antifragile has similarities to the term resilience. “Antifragility exists when companies do not break despite crises and disasters, remain robust and do not lose substance despite this robustness,” says Prof. (FH) DDr. Mario Situm, MBA, Director of Studies Corporate Management at FH Kufstein Tirol. “Robustness is created by overcoming unforeseeable, but also foreseeable shocks that suddenly present themselves.”

RESILIENCE CAN TAKE DIFFERENT FORMS

Karl Christian Handl, CEO Managing Director of Handl Tyrol GmbH, emphasizes the importance of observing other industries: How are they dealing with the changing conditions? He emphasizes the importance of innovation and the courage to manufacture and test new products, even if market success is uncertain. Many processes and procedures in the company have been improved and even optimized as a result of these considerations, which has had a significant impact on resilience.

FACTORS OF BUSINESS RESILIENCE

Thomas Atzwanger, President and Delegate of the Board of Directors of Atzwanger AG, showed how the business model of a plant manufacturer has changed over time and how these changes have been dealt with. He reported that certain business areas should definitely be abandoned if they have no earnings and growth potential. In his opinion, Atzwanger AG's business resilience can be attributed to the factors of professional procurement marketing, streamlining the shareholder structure, optimizing governance and corporate management and strengthening liquidity.

RESILIENCE IN RESTRUCTURING

In the last presentation, Anna Aichinger, shareholder, managing director and authorized signatory of the Aichinger Group, talked about the resilience of a family business during restructuring/reorganization. She reported on the importance of cohesion and, above all, communication within the family in order to resolve and overcome crisis situations.  

SUCCESS FACTORS FOR THE RESILIENCE OF FAMILY BUSINESSES

The key components that make family businesses resilient in times of crisis were the focus of the concluding panel discussion. In addition to the speakers, Denise Schurzmann, Managing Director of Krause Industrieschaltanlagen GmbH, and Franz Pegger, lawyer at GPK Pegger Kofler & Partner, were guests at the Family Business Day. The participants agreed that clear and open communication between family members is an important pillar of success in order to make good decisions. In conclusion, the experts recommended planning the succession in the family business in good time and involving the new owners in the day-to-day business at an early stage. This allows them to gain experience and assume responsibility.

2024 Family Business Day will take place on November 22 from 1 pm.