This case concerns the efforts of a multigenerational family business to leverage and benefit from the board on key related issues: succession of the CEO, chair, and other leadership roles; engagement of the fourth generation as future owners and potential business and governance leaders; and preservation of the family's unity, primarily through fair and transparent practices and processes. In early 2023, multibillion-dollar Wilbur-Ellis was more than 100 years old, with product lines including agribusiness, nutrition, and chemicals. Third-generation family member and CEO John Thacher had overseen organic and acquisition-based revenue growth, along with professionalization of the board, before transitioning to executive chair in 2018 and handing off operating leadership to nonfamily CEO John Buckley. Together, these leaders, along with the full board and family council (led by third-generation family member Matthew Rowland), had helped the business and family navigate multiple transitions, most recently the merger of Wilbur-Ellis's Asian chemical subsidiary into a global specialty distribution business. Readers will take the leaders' perspective as they consider how best to maintain continuity and engagement amid imminent business, governance, and family transitions.

This case concerns the efforts of a multigenerational family company to articulate and document shareholder roles and goals aligned with the enterprise's overarching vision and values. In the summer of 2022, the family owners of well-known window-manufacturer Pella, based in the namesake Iowa city, were well into their fifth generation. No family member worked in the business--per longstanding policy--but fourth-generation members held key governance roles, including as the board chair and directors. With the trustees, other family members, and the CEO, these leaders had worked diligently to define shareholder roles and goals for all governance roles to gain family approval and use the final versions to help management. The board set Pella's vision, priorities, and strategies. The process was tricky because the family was now dispersed across the United States, and none of its members lived near the corporate headquarters. Readers will place themselves in family leaders' shoes as they face challenges, including an unpredictable business environment (such as a volatile housing market) and the question of how best to integrate and unify wide-ranging family interests and preferences for engagement with the enterprise.

This case concerns a family business's efforts to assess and shape collective decision-making among a large sibling leadership group and transition from an informal founder-led operation to a more formalized organization. In late 2021, the family behind MIC Food, a Miami-based processor and distributor of tropical fruits and vegetables, such as plantains, was led by six second-generation siblings, the children of the Honduran-immigrant company founders. The business had come through the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic well, with record expected annual revenue. But as competition and regulation increased, the siblings had to consider whether their informal decision-making--including weekly meetings and regular group texts--should be systematized to ensure strategic and efficient decision-making in the future. Readers will put themselves in the siblings' shoes to consider the best approaches to gaining consensus on strategy and growth goals; sharing power within the sibling group and, potentially, with executives brought in from outside; and creating vision and objectives for bringing the third generation into the enterprise.

Yorgus, a Brazilian entrepreneurial maker of premium Greek yogurt, has hit its stride--and now it faces questions about the best path to achieve growth, including becoming independent of the context in which it was created. Founder Enrico Leta launched the company in mid-2014, and Yorgus grew against the backdrop of the Letas' large family business: Zona Sul, a high-end grocer with 36 stores. Enrico's father, Fortunato, leads Zona Sul, but conflicts in Fortunato's generation resulted in the prohibition of Enrico's generation from joining that business. This led Enrico, his brother Patrick, and other cousins to launch independent food businesses that benefited from some of Zona Sul's resources. Enrico developed Yorgus within Patrick's premium cheese business, Vitalatte, and the brothers collaborate on strategic decisions for both brands. Now Enrico is considering taking Yorgus independent, in part to scale more quickly than his brother would be comfortable attempting. But Enrico must ponder the possible effects of such a move on the current operating arrangement with his brother's business, as well as on his relationship with his brother, his father, and the broader family. The case illustrates common family-enterprise challenges, including independence versus autonomy, shared decision-making, and the alignment of risk appetites.

This case features a family business working to better integrate the voice of the whole family into corporate governance. In November 2019, the Herschend Enterprises board prepared to elect its first family chair in almost 20 years. For several years, the business, which owned and operated multiple popular US-based theme parks and other entertainment offerings, had been governed by a majority independent board led by an independent chair and run by a non-family CEO, with an engaged but largely hands-off family ownership group. Third- and fourth-generation owners struggled with how best to provide input on company direction. This was partly because several longtime independent directors, who were deeply trusted by the family and knew the business very well, were able to shape decisions and wield influence with minimal family input. In this context, the family had recently formed an owners' council responsible for consolidating the owners' voice. But the inaugural council members recognized that family leadership in general remained concentrated among a few members who filled slots on the family council, owners' council, and board. The company therefore had no effective mechanism in place to consolidate the voice of the owners and assure this was heard in the boardroom. Instead, it relied on the individual voices of owners who reached out to independent directors or on owners who already served as family directors. Grappling with these challenges were third- and fourth-generation family and owners' council members Chris (the incoming board chair), Jim, Jonn, and Austin Herschend--all serving or former Herschend corporate board directors. They considered how best to unify and engage the family around issues such as advising and working with the board, engagement of the broad ownership group, determination of optimal profiles for owners' council members and family directors, and the looming decision of moving from an independent chair to a family chair.