In all these years helping family businesses I so frequently face the same culture and situation. Almost every family business cherishes the "doer." They are the first to arrive, the last to leave (if ever), and the ones who can solve any immediate crisis with sheer willpower. In many family business cultures, this relentless execution …
Malta’s Population – 2025
NSO have just published today the latest population figures for Malta in 2025. As an initial statistic the % part of Malta's population from foreign origin stood at 31.06% by end 2025 up from 29.42% by end 2024. The below article examines what these population trends mean for family businesses in Malta.First of all below …
What World Cup Coaches Teach Business Leaders
As I was following some world cup football matches, I could observe how coaches must decide whether to substitute a key player, adjust a tactical formation, or trust a gut instinct as the clock ticks down in front of a global audience. While the setting is a stadium, the environment—intense pressure, public scrutiny, and the …
Continue reading What World Cup Coaches Teach Business Leaders
Lessons from Heineken
I was reading the recent Financial Times report on Heineken’s dramatic governance shake-up, and it struck me as a definitive wake-up call for family businesses everywhere. Facing sliding global beer sales, crippling inflation, and a staggering 30% drop in share price over the last five years, the billionaire De Carvalho-Heineken family was forced to smash …
The Busy Trap
If you’ve ever spent a day inside a family business, you know it feels a bit like operating a high-speed rescue mission. A supplier drops the ball? They pivot in twenty minutes. A customer has an emergency? They jump on the phone and fix it before lunch. Because they don’t have layers of corporate bureaucracy, …
The Founder Mindset in Family Business – A Blessing or a Curse?
I was recently listening to an episode of the Harvard Business School podcast Cold Call, whereby the host Brian Kenny sat down with Professor George Serafeim and Dimitri Papalexopoulos, the long-time CEO and current Chair of Titan Cement International. Founded in 1902, Titan Cement has survived world wars, economic depressions, and radical political shifts. The …
Continue reading The Founder Mindset in Family Business – A Blessing or a Curse?
Lessons from Swatch Group
I was reading the article published on the Financial Times on the 6th June about the Swatch Group. The recent financial turmoil surrounding Switzerland’s Swatch Group reads like a classic corporate family business tragedy. Despite engineering wild consumer marketing hypes the group’s underlying reality is grim: net profits collapsed by nearly 90% to just SFr25 …
A Case Study of a Failed Succession…John Elkann
There is a recurring tragedy in the history of family businesses: the first generation builds the empire, the second expands it, and the next generation—insulated by absolute privilege but devoid of the sharp instincts that forged the dynasty—slowly dismantle it, sometimes under the guise of "modernisation." John Elkann, the chosen grandson and designated heir of …
Continue reading A Case Study of a Failed Succession…John Elkann
Latest Global Research on Family Business
The latest global research on family businesses is outlining that such businesses are undergoing a fundamental structural transition. For decades, research indicated that such family businesses needed to focus on external threats —macroeconomic shocks, sudden liquidity crunches and supply chain updates. However, empirical findings from the world’s leading researchers are now indicating that the primary …
Mislabelling Strong Leaders
I recently came across a compelling article from the Harvard Business Review titled "Why Effective Leaders Get Branded as Problems" by Luis Velasquez, published on May 7, 2026. As I read through Velasquez’s analysis of how organisations misdiagnose high performers, I couldn't help but be struck by how frequently I have witnessed these exact dynamics …
A Business Blog for SMEs & Family Businesses 