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In the Blood: Battles to Succeed in Canada's Family Businesses
In the Blood Battles to Succeed in Canada's Family Businesses Author:Gordon Pitts Power struggles; patriarchal or matriarchal despots; dysfunctional families; clashes over succession; rebellion, revolution, jealousy, and revenge. Sound like Greek tragedy? In fact, it's all going on in the corporate boardrooms and living rooms of Canada's family-owned businesses -- all the way from small convenience chains up to the level of t... more »he Bronfmans, McCains, Irvings and Eatons. And don't underestimate the reach or relevance of these companies. An estimated six million Canadians work for them full- or part-time, whole communities depend on them, and their combined approximate sales volume is around 1.3 trillion dollars.
Transferring power is difficult, often painful. To see a family business pass successfully into a third or fourth generation is rare. Lawsuits and shouting matches are commoner. Well-known author and business reporter Gordon Pitts has talked to numerous survivors for his profiles of twelve companies, judiciously drawn from all across the country. Some of the families are extremely well-known -- like the Molsons and the Batas -- the others, such as the Mitchells of Saskatoon, the Prices of Alberta, the Bentalls of Vancouver, and the Cuddys of Ontario are no less intriguing. Many of Pitts' interviewees talk with raw candour and often bewildered hurt about intimate family issues.
What happens when the entrepreneurs who established these great companies try to pass the baton onto the next generation in their family? As Gordon Pitts reveals in In the Blood, the unfortunate result is often disruption, pain, and familial splits, that can leave not only the fate of the company, but sometimes even whole communities hanging in the balance.
In these remarkably candid profiles, some of Canada's most prominent business families describe the successes and failures of their empires at the hands of family members. Gordon Pitts takes these stories further, offering observations and advice to those trying to avoid such family strife while building empires of their own.« less