Family Values Sustain Family Businesses

"Care for other people needs over your own", Fisk Johnson, chairman and CEO of SC Johnson replied yesterday to a student asking him how to become a successful family business entrepreneur and manager during Value and Continuity in Family Companies: SC Johnson's Extraordinary Case, a lecture organized by the AIdAF-Alberto Falck Chair of Strategic Management in Family Business.

Family values are fundamental for the continuity of family businesses, Johnson said, and are a strength even in a communications perspective. SC Johnson attached the phrase "a family company" to its logo and Fisk Johnson thinks that being a family business makes them credible when they say they know the needs of families – their main market.

SC Johnson is a manufacturer of household goods based in Wisconsin and with operations in 72 countries (Glade, Ziploc, Autan and Raid are among their brands).With 12,000 employees and 8.75 billion $ revenue, the firm is still privately-held and is in the fifth generation of family ownership. It controls an 11 billion $ revenue group.

Sooner or later both families and businesses have to face difficult moments and when a family overcomes such straits their business is reinforced, Johnson said, disclosing his father's and his grandmother's problems with alcohol.

"There's a saying that the first generation creates a business, the second one conserves it and the third one destroys it", said Bocconi's professor Guido Corbetta, AIdAF-Alberto Falck Chair of Strategic Management in Family Business. "Well, the Johnson family proves the saying wrong. One of the secrets is to recreate in every generation the same entrepreneurial spirit".