‘Like Father, Like Son?’ Firms Can Choke on the Tie That Binds : Management: Stepping into a successful parent’s shoes can be traumatic and thankless.

Malcolm S. (Steve) Forbes Jr. was alone in the office at 60th Fifth Ave., cleaning out his father’s desk, when the absolute finality of his father’s death and what it meant to him registered.

“That’s when it hit me,” said Forbes. “Suddenly, you don’t have to pass it by somebody. It all stops with you.”

Following his father’s death Feb. 24, the younger Forbes inherited 51% of the stock of the family’s magazine and newspaper publishing empire and was named president and chief executive of Forbes Inc.

“At work, I think, this is what he would have been doing, so there is a connection,” said Forbes. “This was his life, now it’s my life.”

But Forbes said it would be silly to try to imitate his father’s larger-than-life personality or mimic his father’s passions for motorcycling and hot air ballooning. “He always told us to forget the competition and take it your own way,” said Forbes.

Stepping into a successful and charismatic parent’s shoes can be traumatic, exhausting and thankless, according to family business consultants.

“Trying to follow anybody who is revered and unique is a very difficult thing to do,” said John Ward, a business professor at Chicago’s Loyola University who specializes in family business issues.

“The entrepreneurs whose footsteps are hardest to follow tend to be emotional and paternalistic,” said Ward. “They tend to be huggers and cheerleaders. They are heroes who become bigger than life when they are gone.”

Successors must work very hard to develop their own identity. “They are constantly being compared to their parents,” said Ward. “People make inadvertent and innocent parallels, saying things like, ‘Your dad would be proud.’ ”

Most family-owned businesses sidestep the issue of choosing and grooming a successor because it is too painful for the founder to admit that he or she will die someday. But a lack of planning can jeopardize even the most successful family business, according to Ernest Doud, a family business consultant for Laventhol & Horwath in Los Angeles.

As difficult as it is to treat your children as adults, Doud advises family business founders to not only give their successors the authority to run the business, but the freedom to experiment and make mistakes.

“You can be a parent at home, but you need to be a business partner at the office,” said Doud, who advises several family businesses, including United Ad Label Co. in Brea.

Paul Connolly founded the business about 30 years ago, building it up from the kitchen table to an enterprise that now employs 140 and has sales of about $17 million a year.

His wife, Richardine, a registered nurse, suggested they sell colored labels for hospital charts and pharmaceutical products. These medical-related labels are the mainstay of their thriving business.

Today, all three of the late Paul Connolly’s stepchildren work at United Ad Label. Daughter Shelly Fabian, 38, is vice president of corporate planning. Larry Burns, 43, the older son, is vice president of manufacturing. And Pat Burns, 40, the younger son, serves as president and chief executive.

After receiving his MBA, Pat Burns joined the company in 1977 as an accountant. Two years later, he was named general manager and chief operating officer. When his stepfather died in 1982, Burns took on his job. “The hard part isn’t filling the shoes operationally, but filling the shoes in other ways,” said Burns. He said the most difficult challenge was living up to the traditions set by his stepfather, who loved being the family business patriarch. Burns said his stepfather treated all his employees like family members. “I probably don’t come across as friendly as he was,” he admits.

Most families are not as lucky as the Connollys when it comes to making a smooth transition from parents to children, according to Mark H. Lewin, a management psychologist in Rochester, N.Y. Three years ago, Lewin began conducting group counseling sessions for the troubled sons and daughters of family business owners.

“Almost all of the sons and daughters I’ve dealt with have seriously considered leaving the family business because of the frustrations involved,” said Lewin.

Friction between parents and children is created, he said, because the children may be grown up but “parents still look at them as little kids.”

Parents are also reluctant to accept the changes their children want to make. “There is a need to change the culture when the new person comes into the business,” said Lewin.

He recommends that family business owners encourage their children to gain outside business experience before joining the family firm. And he suggests bringing children into the business gradually. This way, parents can watch their children solve problems and build credibility.

Lewin and other family business gurus said a real crisis can develop when the scion is not able to live up to his parent’s expectations.

One highly publicized example of a son failing to fill his father’s big shoes involved Frederick Wang, the son of An Wang, founder of Wang Laboratories. The elder Wang, a brilliant inventor, died March 24 after a battle with cancer.

Frederick Wang, a computer mathematician, worked with his father for 17 years. At the elder Wang’s urging, his son was given more and more responsibility. In 1986, Frederick Wang was named president of the Lowell, Mass., company.

But during the son’s tenure, Wang Laboratories lost its competitive edge in the office products market and suffered serious and debilitating losses. In August, 1989, eight days after the company reported a $375 million quarterly loss, Frederick Wang resigned.

Analysts blamed the company’s persistent problems and financial descent on the failure of the Wangs to bring in outside management.

Earlier this week, a Wang spokesperson said Frederick Wang was not granting any interviews since the death of his father.

Unlike Wang, Harvey Rosenbluth, founder of Starlite Industries in Rosemont, Pa., never pushed his son Jay into the family business. In fact, he encouraged Jay to study law and work for the public utilities commission.

“I think it’s important for someone not to feel pushed or compelled to do something that they are not sure they want to do,” said Rosenbluth. One of the elder Rosenbluth’s closest friends had been forced to join the family’s paper business and hated it most of his life. After practicing law for a few years, Jay Rosenbluth set up his own diamond-cutting tool business. About six years ago, Starlite bought out the business, and Jay Rosenbluth finally joined his father’s company. Today, he runs it.

“I’m always going to be Harvey’s son,” said Rosenbluth, who frequently seeks his father’s advice. Because they worked together for several years before Harvey retired, Jay said the transition has been very smooth.

“He and I had an understanding from the beginning that we would really have to act as one or it was not going to work,” Jay Rosenbluth said.

While many sons follow their father’s footsteps, Stefan Pollack is following his mother’s.

He joined the Pollack PR Marketing Group in Century City about two years ago after graduating from business school at the University of Southern California. He quit his first job because he wasn’t happy.

“I thought, I’ve got this business right in front of me,” said Pollack. “Maybe we can build it together.”

He said his mother, Noemi Pollack, was shocked when he asked her for a job. But he persuaded her that by giving him all the administrative and financial responsibilities, she could devote more time to the creative side of the business.

“When he first approached me, I had the usual trepidations,” said Pollack. “Will I unconsciously favor him over other employees? Would there be an intimacy that would make other employees feel uncomfortable?”

None of her fears materialized.

“He has brought to the company a vision that I didn’t have,” said Pollack.