Post-MBA Career Goals: Family Business
So, you want to return to your family business after your MBA.
The 2023 EY and University of St.Gallen Family Business Index reports that family businesses generate $8.02 trillion in revenue annually. McKinsey even predicts that family businesses will constitute 40% of the world’s top economic institutions by 2025.
But that doesn’t mean that family businesses don’t have their share of challenges! Management consulting firm Hay Group found that over 72% of family businesses globally do not survive past their third generation. That suggests that there may be a gap in these generations’ ability to create a sustainability strategy and adapt to a rapidly changing business environment.
Business schools are trying to cover this gap. Read on to understand how an MBA can be useful for your family business’s growth, how you should approach your MBA applications as a family business applicant, and which top business schools are ideal for family business applicants.
Why do you need an MBA as a family business applicant?
If you’re considering business school as a family business applicant, you may have some concerns: why spend two years and a significant financial investment on a degree when you already have a position awaiting you?
For family businesses where you have a personal stake in driving innovation and growth, an MBA can equip you with the right tools and network to develop your family’s legacy further. Here’s how:
Leadership Training:
An MBA can help you grow your family business from a family-owned company to a corporate powerhouse. Leadership training can teach you how to manage succession issues, manage family members and set common goals, build consensus for important decisions, direct business strategy, and deal with external stakeholders in a structured manner.
Network:
MBA graduates use their alumni networks and connections to improve the global expansion of their family business. An MBA can help second and third generation leaders take their family business in new directions and markets, all while gaining access to a reliable support network in these new markets. So that post their MBA, graduates can take advantage of opportunities of scale in their industries and transform their family businesses.
Unique business insights
To ensure that their businesses can endure through challenging market conditions and changing leadership, family business students use their MBA knowledge and unique business insights to create adaptive strategies, learn about innovative management practices, gain an international outlook, and navigate industry disruptions and trends. The key management, finance, leadership, communication, and strategy skills that an MBA provides can help family business leaders thrive in a competitive business environment.
Sustainability and Diversity:
With the growing realization that businesses must adapt their traditional ways to make way for modernity if they want to grow, an MBA can help family businesses bring in new perspectives and priorities. It can empower next-gen family business leaders to build and sustain diverse teams, both within management and in their workforce. For many family business MBA graduates, international exposure also helps drive attention to building solid ESG strategies, corporate social responsibility, community engagement, and diversity, equity, and inclusion.
How Do Business Schools View Family Business Applicants?
Family business candidates make up a significant portion of the MBA classroom. For example, in IESE’s MBA Class of 2022, approximately 10% of the class were family business candidates. Business schools want to attract family business applicants for several reasons:
When you graduate from business school, you already have a built-in network in your family business and, more than likely, a senior-level position waiting for you. That means you can quickly find employment – which supports your business school’s ranking and employment report data.
Another reason why business schools like family business applicants are their unique origin stories that represent their family’s and company’s values, diverse backgrounds, and personal connection to their goals. As a family business candidate, you already have a remarkable story. Developing the ability to combine a professional story with a personal experience is an effective essay strategy.
Most family business applicants are often given early responsibility in multiple aspects of the company, from manufacturing to management to design and marketing. As the family business is passed down to the next generation, these applicants are familiar with industry trends, have many valuable connections, and are often good communicators. This diverse skill set and exposure to various business functions appeals to MBA AdComs, as it differentiates them from highly-specialized applicants.
Finally, many family businesses have been established for decades. That means that these applicants are more likely to be self-funded and may be important connections for the school for recruiting, donations, and industry partnerships. As SWC consultant Alex Zarganis says: When he studied at Columbia, he never saw a poor international MBA student!
How Can Family Business Applicants Make Their MBA Applications Stand Out?
Like all other MBA applicants, a family business applicant should highlight examples of their leadership and accomplishments at work. This way they can show that they are adding value to the organization – not just as someone who is excellent at a job handed to them by their parents, but as someone who can excel equally in any organization.
If you are a family business applicant, focus on the challenges and growth opportunities of this role that you wouldn’t have been able to achieve elsewhere. Working with family is hard; not only are you managing delicate family dynamics, but you are responsible for their legacy. As an MBA applicant, you should highlight how you are doing things differently and what you can do better with an MBA.
Consider: In this role, how did you help the company grow? What objectives did you achieve? What difference has your leadership made to your family business? Remember to provide specific data points to support your achievements.
How Should You Approach Your Recommendations as a Family Business Applicant?
For family business applicants, securing strong letters of recommendation is often tricky. If your direct supervisor is a family member, it would be inappropriate to ask them for a recommendation letter, although they would likely provide a glowing one. Business schools would perceive this as a conflict of interest.
Instead, ask a non-family member who can attest to your abilities, such as a company board member, a non-family supervisor, or a major client well-acquainted with your work.
If your family business is entirely run by family members, seek recommendations from outside the business. Consider asking a customer, supplier, or mentor who has graduated from a reputable MBA program, or a supervisor from a volunteer or extracurricular organization or club where you hold a leadership position.
Which MBA Programs Are Best for Family Business Applicants?
Several top MBA programs have specific resources, courses, specializations, and networks tailored to family business professionals. Some top schools include:
Kellogg School of Management (Northwestern University): Kellogg offers a Family Enterprise Club and courses on family business leadership.
INSEAD: With its global perspective, INSEAD provides a robust curriculum for family business owners, including elective courses on governance and succession planning.
Wharton: The Wharton Global Family Alliance is a unique academic-family business partnership established through an agreement between the Wharton School and the CCC Alliance.
IE Business School: Known for its emphasis on entrepreneurship, IE has a dedicated Center for Families in Business.
Harvard Business School: HBS’s case method approach is particularly useful for addressing complex family business challenges.
IMD Business School: Located in Switzerland, IMD’s Global Family Business Center is a leader in research and education for family enterprises.
IESE: The Chair of Family Business generates research and peer-reviewed publications, and actively participates in international conferences, research summits and educational initiatives, including regular sessions in IESE’s Alumni Learning Program.
Need help positioning your MBA application for your Family Business goals? Book a free 20 min chat with one of our expert consultants here.
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