In
a study examining the intricacies of the unique role of “most trusted advisor”
(MTA) in several family firms, academic researcher Vanessa Strike identifies
the processes and characteristics which enable these enigmatic, full-time
family enterprise advisors to earn the trust of family members, capture their
attention and then facilitate collective change as a result of their earned
trust and role in the family enterprise.
Published
in the September 2013 issue of The Family
Business Review and the first study of its kind focused exclusively on
family enterprise advising, “The Most Trusted Advisor and the Subtle Advice
Process in Family Firms” [http://fbr.sagepub.com/content/26/3/293.full.pdf+html]
paints a portrait of the otherwise secretive and subtle phenomenon of the
advice process by closely examining nine MTAs who work within six well-established
North American family firms which have been around anywhere from 30 to 120
years.
Firstly
and arguably most importantly, Strike identifies MTAs as quite distinct from
what most professionals in the field of family enterprise consider to be
‘advisors’ or ‘consultants’ to family firms, who most commonly have several
clients and work with different types of family enterprises.
Likening
a MTA to a “quarterback” who is devoted to a single family firm for many years
or even decades, this special role is deeply involved in the most detailed and
private areas of the family relationships as well as the business. The MTA is
heavily invested in the long-term success of the family enterprise system in
which they work, even sometimes referring to the members as “their” family.
Strike makes a point of illustrating that these MTAs shun the spotlight and
much prefer to be hidden from view, quoting one MTA as saying “[i]f nobody
knows who I am or what I do, then I know I’m doing my job.”
Being
such a highly trusted and integral person involved in a family business, the
MTA is highly skilled, maintains very broad-reaching knowledge and does not
suffer a loss of confidence when the family’s needs warrant the hiring of
experts or advisors who have more specialized expertise than themselves. The
MTA is not at all threatened by these other professionals, but rather holds the
goals of the family in the highest esteem. In some cases, the MTA is so
well-integrated into the family as a confidante that neither the family, nor
the MTA, even identifies their role as a “most trusted advisor.”
Until
now, these MTAs have gone completely unrecognized and unstudied in the field of
family enterprise. Previous research on advising in family businesses has focused
on specific models or intervention processes, which presumes that the advisor
has been brought in for a specific task or project, where the start and end of
the relationship is pre-determined or defined. Instead, Strike wanted to look
closely at advisors who act in an ongoing, “trusted advising capacity” and
could have been a family’s accountant, lawyer, or member of an advisory board
or board of directors, but was in fact a much more integral part of the family
enterprise than any one of those roles would imply.
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