The founder who can’t let go: handing over a business as a family transition and a grief

“I’ve only come to have a look.”

It is seven in the morning and the office is still quiet. A man of seventy-four, who officially handed the business over to his daughter three years ago, sits at the table in the meeting room with the morning paper and a coffee. At the nine o’clock meeting he will sit at the side and “just listen”. By ten he will twice have recalled how things used to be done. By eleven one of the longer-serving employees will come to him, not to her, to check whether the contract really should be signed. That evening, at home, the daughter will tell her partner: “On paper, it’s all mine. In reality, none of it is.”

Many families with a business know this scene. On the surface it is a story about succession, about authority and signatures. Underneath it is a story about something older: a person saying goodbye to part of themselves, and a family that does not know how to accompany them through it. That is what this piece is about. Not how to carry out a handover legally or commercially — other experts exist for that — but why handing over the business is so often painful, and what happens in the family along the way. I am writing for founders who recognise themselves in this, and for their children who are waiting beside them.

A handover is not an event but a transition

In family businesses, succession is often talked about as a date: the day of signing, the day the managing director changes. But in the life of a family, a handover is not an event. It is a transition — a period in which everyone in the family has to learn anew who they are. The founder learns who he is without the business. The successor learns who she is when she is no longer just “the son” or “the daughter”. The founder’s partner learns to live with someone who is now at home all day.

The family therapists Monica McGoldrick, Betty Carter and colleagues described the family life cycle: the sequence of stages a family passes through, and the transitions between them, which are always also times of vulnerability. One of the more demanding is the stage when parents grow older and the weight of responsibility slowly shifts to the next generation. In a family with a business, this transition is doubled: what moves is not only care for the family, but also the leadership of something that was for a long time the centre of everything. You will find short explanations in the knowledge base under the family life cycle and transition.

Transitions are hard for people without a business too. The researcher Mo Wang followed a large sample of American retirees to see how their psychological well-being changed after retirement. Around seventy per cent went through the transition without major changes, while about a quarter experienced a noticeable drop in well-being in the first period, which only improved over time. Retirement, then, is not the same for everyone. It is often hardest for those for whom work was the biggest part of who they are — and founders are often exactly such people.

What a founder really loses

When we say a founder “doesn’t know how to let go”, it sounds like stubbornness or a hunger for power. Sometimes it is. Mostly, though, it is a loss so large that it cannot simply be set down on the table. A founder does not just lose a job. He loses:

• a role that for decades gave shape to his day — the reason to get up at six;
• an identity that has often grown together with the business, so that it is no longer clear where one ends and the other begins;
• people — employees, customers, suppliers who were his company more than many a friend;
• the sense of being needed, and with it the sense of still being in his prime;
• and often, deep down, the denial of transience: as long as I am in charge, I am not old.

That last point matters. Handing over a business is one of the few moments in life when a person officially, and in front of everyone, admits that their time is passing. No wonder many put it off. Not because of the business, but because of what this step means. I wrote more about how losing a position shakes identity in When the position is gone: identity after power, and about the wider transition into retirement in Retirement, the loss of a role and the question of meaning.

Four ways of leaving

In the 1980s the leadership researcher Jeffrey Sonnenfeld interviewed many retired senior executives and described four ways in which they leave. His typology is not a psychological diagnosis and did not come from founders of family businesses, but many people recognise themselves in it.

Monarchs do not leave until illness or death takes them. Generals leave because they must, but secretly wait to be called back. Ambassadors step aside in good time and remain available as advisers. Governors see leadership as a period that ends, and after leaving they begin something new.

The man in the opening scene is probably somewhere between a general and a monarch. Not because he is a bad person or a bad father, but because he has never seen any other way. So the important question is not “which type is my father”, but: what would he need in order to become an ambassador?

Grief nobody acknowledges

When someone close dies, people know what to do. They send condolences, come to the funeral, ask how you are for a few weeks. But when someone says goodbye to a business they built over forty years, people congratulate them. “Now you’ll finally have time for yourself.” “You’ve earned it.” Nobody says: “I’m sorry for your loss.”

The American grief researcher Kenneth Doka coined the term disenfranchised grief for losses like these — grief that others do not see or do not recognise as legitimate. I wrote about it in The grief nobody acknowledges: miscarriage, divorce, losing a job. For a founder, this grief is doubly invisible: those around him do not acknowledge it, and often he does not acknowledge it himself. The men and women of this generation, who built their businesses through hard work, are not used to saying “this is hard for me”. Instead, they come into the office “just to have a look”.

When we look at a founder’s refusal to leave as grieving a role, much appears in a different light. Coming back to the office is not necessarily distrust of the successor — it can also be a visit to a place where someone used to be. Criticising new decisions is not necessarily a wish for control — it can also be the pain of watching things change without him. You will find a short explanation of grief in the knowledge base under grieving.

Control as a defence

As early as 1988 the psychologist Ivan Lansberg wrote about what he called “the succession conspiracy”. He observed that in family businesses the handover often goes undiscussed because everyone fears it — not only the founder. The founder fears transience and loss. The partner fears what it will be like with their spouse at home all day. The children fear that talking about it will hurt a parent or expose rivalry between them. The employees fear change. All of them together, without ever agreeing to it, stay silent. And so the handover is postponed.

In this silence, control turns out to be a defence. As long as I am signing, I am still needed. As long as I know more than my successor, I am still irreplaceable. As long as the last word is mine, nothing has ended yet. The idea of the circle of control — the difference between what we can influence and what we cannot — is described in the knowledge base under circle of control. Ageing is one of those areas outside the circle. The business is inside it. That is why control over the business sometimes tightens precisely when control over one’s own life begins to slip.

What is happening in the family meanwhile

A family is a system, and when one person in it cannot take a step forward, the others stop too. This is the subject of The family as a system: why one member’s change moves the whole family.

The successor is left in an in-between space: they already carry the responsibility, but not yet the authority. At forty or fifty, in front of the staff, they feel like a child with a father looking over their shoulder. How hard it is to separate a parent from a boss is the subject of Father as boss: how to separate family from business. Many successors do not talk about it because it feels ungrateful — after all, they were given a business, so what is there to complain about?

The founder’s partner is often the only one who sees both sides: their spouse’s distress at home and their child’s distress at work. They can end up as a go-between, telling the child to be patient and the spouse to give way — and only half satisfying either. Sometimes the partner has a loss of their own as well: they too were part of the business’s story, though it is rarely spoken of.

The other children, who are not in the business, watch from a distance. Some with relief, others with resentment, because it seems to them that everything revolves around one child and one business.

This is how a conversation where all of this meets might sound (a composite, not a real person):

“Dad, I can’t lead if the staff keep coming to you to check my decisions.”
“I don’t send them. They come on their own.”
“I know. But you don’t send them back to me.”
“So what should I do, pretend I don’t know?”
“No. I just want you to trust me. And to tell me how you’re doing. I don’t think it’s easy for you.”
(a long silence)
“I don’t know what to do with myself in the mornings.”

That last sentence is the one that counts. Only when the conversation moves from authority to loss can something shift.

The two paths of grief

The grief researchers Margaret Stroebe and Henk Schut described the dual process model: a grieving person oscillates between two orientations. One faces the loss — remembering, sadness, saying goodbye. The other faces restoration — new tasks, new roles, new relationships. Healthy grieving is not one or the other, but movement between them. The model was developed around bereavement, but it transfers well to other major losses.

Founders who get stuck often stay on one side. Some live entirely in what was — telling how they started out in a garage, and finding nothing that comes after. Others jump across too quickly: they buy a house by the sea, fill their diary, and six months later they are standing in the office again, because they never worked through the loss. Restoration without grieving is escape. Grieving without restoration is being stuck.

Exercise: what remains mine

This exercise is meant for the founder. If you are the successor, you can read it and consider whether to suggest it to your parent — or do it yourself, from your own point of view. It takes half an hour, and you can do it today.

1. Write down what the business gave you that appears on no balance sheet. Not money, but the rest: a reason to get up, respect, company, a sense of importance, the rhythm of the week. List at least five things.
2. Next to each item, write whether it is tied to the position or to you. The respect of people you helped stays yours. Signing contracts does not.
3. For those tied to the position, find a new home. Where else can you find rhythm, company, a sense of being useful? You are not looking for a substitute for the business, but for a new place for the need.
4. Write down one thing you will have to give up, and write it a short farewell. Perhaps it is your office, perhaps the morning meeting. Write what it meant to you and what you are sorry to see end.
5. Tell someone. Your partner, a friend, your successor. Not as a complaint, but as a fact: “This is ending for me, and it’s hard.”

The fifth step is the hardest. But it is also the one that lets the family know, for the first time, that this is not about control but about loss. And people respond to loss differently from how they respond to control.

When it is not about grief

I want to be fair: not every delay in handing over is unprocessed grief. There are other reasons too, and sometimes the founder’s hesitation is justified.

The successor may genuinely not be ready yet. A parent who sees this is not necessarily jealous of their role. They may simply be careful. In that case it is worth talking about what readiness would mean — and whether the expectations are realistic, or so high that nobody could meet them.

It may be about security. For many founders, the business is also their only pension. Fear of handing over is then also fear for survival, and therapy does not solve that. That is a question for financial and legal advisers.

Health may be changing. If you notice forgetfulness in a parent, the same questions being repeated, unusual irritability or a change of personality, it is not necessarily just grief. Then it is right to see a doctor. It is a sensitive matter, but an important one.

And staying active is not an illness. For many people in later life, work and a sense of usefulness are a source of health. The aim is not for the founder to disappear. The aim is for him to find a role that does not trap the successor — but supports them.

How therapy can help

Stories like these are rarely the story of one person. So it often makes sense for several family members to come to a session — the founder, the partner, the successor, perhaps the other children too. Not to negotiate business matters, but so that each of them can say what this transition means to them. It is often the first time a father hears how his daughter feels, and the first time a daughter hears what her father is afraid of. I also work with English-speaking clients, in person in Ljubljana.

With handovers, looking back often helps too. How did the previous handover happen — perhaps from grandfather to father, perhaps of a farm or a craft workshop? Was it forced, too quick, or did it never happen at all? How has the family always grieved — loudly, quietly, or not at all? In a longer session with a genogram, A Look into the Past, we can look at these patterns together. When a founder sees that he is repeating something he once experienced as a child, he often softens.

If the distress is greater — if someone in the family has not been sleeping for a long time, is withdrawing, has lost interest in everything or has thoughts that life no longer has meaning — please see a doctor. In Slovenia you can also call the crisis line Klic v duševni stiski on 01 520 99 00 (every day from 7 pm to 7 am) or the Samaritans helpline on 116 123 (24 hours a day). In an emergency, call 112. You will find more about how we feel at the start of new chapters in New job, new city, new chapter: the psychology of life transitions.

What to remember

• Handing over a business is not only a business event but a family transition, in which everyone has to learn anew who they are.
• A founder loses not just a job but a role, an identity, people and often the sense of still being in his prime — this is grieving a role.
• Control is often a defence against loss and ageing; when the conversation moves from authority to loss, something can shift.
• A healthy transition oscillates between saying goodbye to what was and building what will be.
• Not every delay is grief: the successor’s readiness, financial security and health matter too.