Is That Me or Is That the Old Man? Family Patterns in Business

Interpersonal conflict is one of the biggest reasons why 70% of family businesses don't make it to the third generation. If I can help them change themselves and their own patterns in relation to the others, they can start changing the system. Is that me or is that the old man? Their business rests on their harmony. Welcome to My Shout, the podcast where we have candid conversations about family business transition. Today's guest is Tom Skotidas, a family business psychotherapist, who once upon a time ran a B2B sales and marketing business alongside his brother.

In today's episode, we're gonna unpack what we can learn from his experience in psychotherapy, which will help us understand how family dynamics underpin the success of a family business. Tom, thanks for sitting down with me, man. Cheers. Cheers, Shane. I'm curious, my friend. So you're a family business - psychotherapist. - Yep. But once upon a time, you're a B2B sales and marketing - expert. - That's - right. - Take me to the point where you're sitting there as a B2B sales and marketing expert and you go, I think I might wanna be a psychotherapist.

Well, I've wanted to be a psychotherapist since I was 20. I remember seeing Tony Robbins, not live, but online. And although I've never been a big fan of his, what he was doing with people felt like something I would wanna do, help them in a way that is sustainable. Not jumping up and down. No, no, not at all. But, and it stayed with me and I, my brother reminds me to this day, I went out and bought 20 or 30 books on psychotherapy and started reading them.

But it never stuck because I suppose growing up in New York, that American mentality, I wanted to do something potentially more exciting, more lucrative. So I got into sales and marketing and, you know, pursued different roles through my career. And moved to Australia in 2004. And then in 2011 I launched a LinkedIn training agency. It was the first of its kind in Asia Pacific. And I worked with hundreds of clients and it was a high-flying life. Singapore, Hong Kong, throughout Australia. But then COVID hit and my training business slowed down quite a lot.

And I had time to think through what I wanted post-COVID. And I turned to my wife and I asked her, I said, babe, do you think at my funeral, people will come by and shake your hand and our four daughters' hands and say, sorry about Tom. He generated some great leads for me on LinkedIn? And she said, I'm sorry, babe, I don't think so. And it was a kind of a turning point for me to think about what I always wanted to do, which is to be a psychotherapist.

So I said to her, I'm thinking of applying for the Master's of Psychotherapy and Counselling. Are you okay with that? And she goes, go for it. So I did, back in two thousand and twenty-one, and 2023, I graduated with the Master's of Psychotherapy, opened my practice and haven't looked back ever since. And if I read correctly, the initial, I'm gonna call it permutation of your practice, was around helping co-founders. How does that transition to helping families? Well, the private practice was, I work with, and I still work with, individuals and couples and, by request, families, but within that private population, about one in 10 of all of my clients were family business leaders.

They'd come in as a couple wanting to overcome betrayal, and then within 30 minutes of talking to them, their business would enter the room and take a seat. Or I'd speak to individuals who would then reveal they're part of a family business. So, and part of it, there were also co-founders in there as well who were experiencing psychological disruption because of their co-founder relationship. So it became a very appealing cohort for me. And I decided in October or September last year to launch a new practice, which is entirely dedicated to family business psychotherapy.

And about one in 10 of my clients are also co-founders who come to me saying, we're not family, but we're best mates. Can you help us? I was reading, obviously you've got a lot of blogs and things online, and I was reading sort of the patterns of the types of things that you sort of see. And one of the things that struck me is you're talking about grief, and I'm genuinely curious, you know, a 68-year-old business founder who's got three kids in his business, I'm imagining he doesn't come to the table and start talking about grief.

So - No. - How do you pick it? The question is touching to me because when I am able to pick it, it's a really special moment and I'm not exaggerating the emotion I'm feeling right now. It, to be able to go beneath what is apparent into what someone feels and for them to be willing to share, that is really amazing. And to answer your question, as I sit here with you or anyone, there are moments, a micro facial expression or a slight movement that doesn't align with what the person's saying or just a feeling in my gut.

And if I feel that there's grief there, I have the courage to say, I'm just wondering in that moment when you said that, I felt grief come up in me. I'm wondering if it came up in you as well. And usually I'm spot on and that gives permission to the other person to actually say, yeah, actually does. So those moments to me are magic. So when you make that connection, that's not a sales and marketing expert picking something and selling psychotherapy, that's a genuine reaction. No, I don't.

Look, sales and marketing taught me how to sell, how to position, and it's been helpful for positioning my practice. But there is no selling when it comes to mental health, when it comes to relationships. That would be effectively an ambulance chaser. So it's a different type of sale, if you will. It's one where I'm there to share how I'm being affected, what I'm picking up, and that's offered as a gift to the other person. Now, they might take that and go, thanks, bye. And that's - fine. - Now, interestingly, I picked up on, you talked about the body language or the movement or something.

When I asked the question earlier about grief, you kind of paused for a second. Did I just poke the bear? You noticed it. Yeah. That's brilliant. Look, I had a meeting just a few days ago with someone who, the meeting was supposed to be just business, talking about my practice and how we can refer to each other. It was meant to be pure business, pure referral based. And during that coffee we had, I noticed grief. I brought it up, and it just changed the conversation. And what he shared with me actually affected me.

It was a very tender moment. So that's literally what came up for me. And you nailed it right there. And is your reaction to the story or the, what they told you or something personal or was it a combination? Nothing personal came up, but... Just the human reaction. Absolutely. And I'm sure that parts of my background resonated, but nothing personal came up. But to have someone who's showing up in this big business, strong, you know, energy to then trust you to share something like that, it's really humbling.

So what I do, you know, when I launched my private practice, my income plummeted. But my happiness skyrocketed. And of course I'm grateful to my wife for holding the fort in terms of our income and her patience. But it's that happiness and fulfilment and moments like the one you picked up on that to me are worth a million bucks a year. It's interesting. You mentioned your wife's role. There was obviously a, you know, that's the point, a point in time where there's the expectation around, hey, you said hold the fort, - right? - Yeah.

And I remember exactly the same moment when I decided to change careers and I, like, hey, I want to go and do this thing. And Kelly's like, well, guess if that's what you wanna do. And obviously you are now on the other side of that, but that's not the first time you've started a new journey, I'm guessing. Talk me back through your journey of starting and owning and selling a business. Well, in 2011, I launched a LinkedIn training agency. And how this ties in with family business therapy is when I launched it, it grew fast and I needed help.

So I asked my brother to join the business and that was 2011. So since then we've been working together. As the business grew, he was right there supporting me, you know, working himself in the business, but we had conflict. And he knows all of my secrets. So anytime I try to show off my psychotherapy skills, he'll remind me of something embarrassing when we were 12 years old, which I just can't overcome. There's a limit to how much psychotherapy can overcome with your own family members, especially your siblings.

So having him there as a support and working with my brother was brilliant, but also the conflict was also rough. And we would bounce back, work again. But I'm also aware that that working relationship took a toll in our relationship. Our relationship now is very strong, but back then I remember how it often caused these silence gaps for us where we wouldn't talk for two or three weeks. So although my family business is much smaller than most of my clients, it was the beginning of my education on what a family business dynamics looks like.

In this case, we were brothers, business colleagues and asset owners, so three nervous systems in one, and that's a very, very difficult situation to be in. Might let you sit with that for a moment. I'm thinking about what you've learned about psychotherapy now, which you can reflect on and go, what was happening there and how did it make you feel and what was wrong? Looking back at that as the, you know, Tom, you are now, what were you observing? I'll give you an insight that I think there are many insights that I've learned as a therapist, but I think the biggest one is how humans operate on blind patterns.

It's actually quite scary how much of our behaviour is literally replays of what we noticed growing up. So as you grow up, you watch your parents, your uncles and aunties, your older siblings, it's like a theatre play and you just watch how they show up in different situations and you literally learn that at an emotional level and then replay it as you get older. The mind is constantly searching for the right relational scene to pick up. So for me, the relational scene that I often exhibited with my brother is anger.

I would just get so angry with him, I would say, you're doing this wrong or, what were you thinking? Just anger and sometimes contempt and looking back at it now, and I do this work with my clients, my anger, my contempt, and my clients' anger and contempt was never the first emotion. That's a big insight I wanna share with your audience. If you express anger or contempt towards someone, pause with the TV remote control. Just pause yourself, rewind a little bit and ask yourself, what was the first emotion I actually felt before anger and contempt, but it's so painful, I avoided it and went to anger and contempt.

The answer is almost always shame, sadness, or fear. Sometimes joy, believe it or not, people avoid joy as well. But shame, sadness and fear are the emotions you feel first. But because they're so dangerous to feel and there's reasons for that, people will avoid them. They will shut them down and suppress them. But when you've done that, Shane, how do you make meaning of what's just happened? How do you make meaning when you've just shut down key navigational emotions? You make meaning by letting your brain pick a relational scene growing up and you just replay it.

And for me that was anger. My dad would get angry a lot and contemptuous. So there are moments when I wish I could take them back, where I could say to my brother, actually, this isn't your fault the way I just behaved. It's me playing out a scene, which I haven't thought through. But honestly, brother, I'm very sad that we can't seem to get along, or I'm fearful that this business will break our relationship apart. That would've been a much better spot rather than anger or contempt.

And so you kind of alluded there, this is a learned behaviour somewhat between either you and your brother or learned maybe from your old man. Is that the same pattern you see in your clients? Absolutely. And we all do that. All of us replay aspects of what we witnessed growing up with others. And I think that is the shittiest part of my job, is recognising that humans, 50 to 80% of what we do is just replays. That's quite sobering and hard to sit with. But if you turn that coin, it's also an amazing opportunity to go, whoa, that's what I'm doing now.

Let me break that pattern. Let me just smash it and build a new pattern that's mine. Not the old man's, not my mom's, not my high school or primary school teacher, but my pattern. That's the opportunity. So it's both sobering and also incredibly hopeful. You recognise that pattern. Now, looking back, it obviously played out differently. You and your brother barneying in the business. Does that have an obvious, call it business impact that you can now put a pin on and go, that behaviour that I exhibited meant that result for my business?

Or is it not as clear cut? Oh, it's clear cut. Look, the fact that we would make up and put our arms around each other like brothers, is great. But ultimately the days of silence or the hours of avoiding each other or potentially him, you know, giving me the middle finger metaphorically or literally behind my back and not doing his work, add up and maybe between the two of us, that might be a small amount. But if you are in a bigger business and you add up all that lost time, we're talking about, you know, hundreds of hours of lost productivity and more importantly, these are cuts, Shane.

You know, trauma doesn't have to reveal itself with one big cut like an earthquake or a beating. Trauma can also just be a thousand small cuts, which I call emotional scratches, where each scratch is an emotional or nervous system overwhelm, and then you get on with life and then you're overwhelmed again and another scratch. And these have cumulative effects. So I'm curious then, what do you, now that you've done your study and you have your new practice and what have you, what's the learning now? What do you know now that you didn't know then?

Well, another insight is that once we form patterns, behavioural patterns, they're very hard to break. And I think what's important for people to know is that if you know someone in your life who keeps doing the same thing and you've told him or her, stop doing that, and they've said, yep, okay, I'll stop doing that. And then they continue. It's not because they have an inferior personality. It's because when patterns are repeated, it's because when they first began, they were useful to the person, useful to cope with a traumatic scenario, useful to cope with other pressures they're experiencing.

So we call patterns adaptive or maladaptive. When they first form, they're adaptive 'cause they help you adapt to what you're receiving from others. But then they become rigid. And the reason they're rigid is because in the brain you get this synaptic pairing where literally the amygdala, your threat centre, is screaming threat. It looks for a stimulus, the object that caused the threat and it pairs them. And that pairing effectively, and I'm not doing science full justice, but it's a very simplified way of explaining it, that pairing cannot be undone ever.

So what needs to then happen is if you want to stop that pattern of behaviour, you can't just wish that synaptic pairing away. What you have to do is build a new pattern of behaviour and drill it against the same stimulus, so that it actually becomes paired in the mind, just like the original pairing. And that's called inhibitory learning because it inhibits the original pairing, Shane. But most people never get to do that. They stay at the theory or the aha moment. But, and when I work with business families more than any other segment, they want results because their business rests on their harmony, relies on their harmony.

So for results to happen, I will work with them and actually in the room do exercises where they're literally acting out new behaviours that align to who they want to be. And while they're doing them, they might go, ugh, this is so awkward, weird. And yet they're doing it because they agree with me that to build those behaviours, you have to actually do them and train the brain that way. That's a big insight. Yeah. Right. So if I was to play that back, you grow up in a house where when Mum gets angry, Dad shuts up and you learn the behaviour of just be quiet and the noise will stop.

A hundred percent. And because there's a, the prefrontal cortex here, this part, this is where we discriminate. Like if you said, Tom, you're a very ugly guy, I would be surprised, but my prefrontal cortex would process that cognitively and go, no, I don't think so. I think I might not be Brad Pitt, but I'm not ugly. I'm not that bad looking. So I would chew it and spit it out. But kids, and this is the key window between zero to 15 or 16, the prefrontal cortex is especially vulnerable to light processing.

And so when you, when they, when it receives inputs, when that relational scene you just said, it literally doesn't think, Dad has problems, he needs therapy. It literally goes, oh, Mom is yelling at Dad. Dad stop talking. Mom lets him go or leaves him alone. So that's a relational scene I can replay when someone's yelling at me, especially a female potentially. And then we replay that. And then extrapolate that out to, we're now in a family business and I'm working for Mum and Dad. And that's happening in the boardroom.

That's right. Yeah. Some of my clients will say, Tom, I'm an introvert. It's just how I am. And, I mean, I'm not God and I'm not inside their mind. So I actually have clients who will say to me, I'm an introvert, so when I withdraw, it's just who I am. Who we think we are is often who we are, plus responses to trauma and replayed scenes that we have borrowed from our caregivers and have become so assimilated with us that we think it's who we are, but it's not.

And that's another insight, which is mind-blowing for me when I learn this, is my identity is who I know I am right now, my values and who I want to be. It's not what Dad believed, but I'm aware that many of my beliefs come from Dad. So even as a therapist, every day I'll have to struggle with prejudices that come up. And when a prejudice comes up, I'll think, yeah, that's what I think. And then I'll stop myself and go, is that me or is that the old man?

That's another benefit of therapy. It gets you to stop and actually examine your own behaviour. That's an interesting one. So, 'cause I remember reading something and I'm not, I know the numbers get disputed all the time depending on which academic you're looking at. But I remember reading something you'd said, or maybe you'd quoted was, you know, 70% of family businesses never reached that second gen. And is that partly because, or is there any relationship between that statistic and this cycle of, I can't stand up to the old man, therefore the old man doesn't think I'm ready and we get stuck in a quagmire?

Well, that's what the research says. It actually says that interpersonal conflict is one of the biggest reasons why 70% of family businesses don't make it to the third generation. It's so invisible though, Shane. It, we know it's there, but we don't talk about it. I don't know what your experience is, but when you're dealing with a family business, people don't talk about emotions. They'll say they don't belong in the boardroom. They don't talk about patterns. No one talks about replaying old scenes. You probably will get something like, what are you doing?

We're in business here, let's get on with it. Would you agree with that? Yeah. I'm almost, what's popping in my head is how often does what you do now and the reaction you've just had, which is we should be, I'm seeing the pattern in a house with four daughters and a missus. How often are they sitting there going, Dad, stop the psychobabble. Stop, stop being, stop being a therapist. Be my dad for a minute. Well, I'll tell you a story. You have to be careful. I, my wife was angry with me recently.

And I said to her, hey, babe, I think underneath the anger you might have avoided shame. And then you arrived at anger, and she said, dear husband, take your shame and shove it up your ass. And I said, yep. Okay. So I accepted that. Again, another example where psychotherapy doesn't work, my own wife. But yes, I pick up patterns. There's a family business adviser, her name is Emily Hammon. She's based in Sydney, amazing adviser. And she calls me Mr Patterns because ultimately if you are not sure what psychotherapy is, if you're still confused, like what is it?

Think what patterns do I see in my business partner, my business colleague that reoccurs and is disruptive to us? The question then becomes, all right, that's the map, the pattern. Let's work off the map. So where does the pattern come from? Why was it formed? How did it help you once? Is it still helping you? If not, we need to break it. We need to replace it. So I think patterns for me is my map. When I'm confused about theory or I've just studied too much and I don't know what to think, I just sit there and observe the family members, and it literally comes up just like when you saw me earlier with my grief.

It's right there. And if you have that curiosity and inquire into it, it opens up all this data. And of course I'm being super careful knowing what you do to not try and open up any of that data. 'Cause that we might, that might be awkward. So I'm curious, is that a pattern that you recognise, if I just misdiagnosed that, but more importantly, does it work when only one member of a family is recognising patterns and the others aren't playing the game? Or is it all in or not at all?

Well, if you recognise a pattern in others and you have that education, that skill, the only person you can control is yourself. I, and I teach this to my clients all the time. They'll say, what's the point, Tom? Now I get it. I see the pattern. I can speak my mind and my values and I've never done it before, but what's the point? I'll go to the patriarch or the matriarch and I'm just gonna get rejected. The point is not to get them to change. The point is to change yourself, 'cause all change starts from you.

Which is why when I'm working with a family system of, say, seven people, I don't need to work with all seven. I can just work with two or three. If I can help them change themselves and their own patterns in relation to the others, they can start changing the system. If you enter this thinking, oh, I now can see patterns, I'll mention them and that will fix our relationship. It doesn't work that way. Both parties have to do the work in a family system, a business family, all parties ultimately have to do the work, and if they don't do the work, those that do the work in confronting the others who haven't, and confrontation doesn't mean violence.

It just means showing up who they are. That provides a role modelling for the others, and a permission for the others to show up themselves. I can just see a scenario where I'm sitting there going, I've just identified the pattern. You've just, you've demonstrated it, and my immediate action is to go, there you go again. Same old behaviour, and your reaction is to go... I think what I'm hearing you saying is, that's obvious. That's not gonna work. So I know I've gotta do something differently. If it's not to call out the fact that you are doing what you always do, what do I have to do differently?

Well, another option is to leave the business. Right. When I work with clients, they're aware that in working with them, one or more members, it's unusual, but it happens, may come into realising who they are, may realise their identity isn't theirs. It's enmeshed with the family. And in the process of un-enmeshing it and creating their own identity, they may determine, I don't want to succeed, Dad. I don't wanna be in this business. I wanna be an artist. And that is hard because I'm also a human being and in the background, I'm cheering for the business family to make it all together.

But as a therapist, that doesn't matter. I'm, when I work with the family, I'm for each person and then for all. But within that, if one person says, Tom, thanks, but I've just realised I don't wanna be part of this business. I want to do this, then I have succeeded in my work. But that then creates that conflict where others might say, how dare you leave? You can't leave. You have the same surname. You're part of our legacy. That hasn't happened yet. In terms of the response from a family, in my work, families are quite understanding, but I'm sure it's gonna, it's around the corner.

Yeah. I mean, you could see, it's no secret. You'll get kids who go, I've figured out, I don't wanna live Mum and Dad's dream, that's theirs and not mine. And I wanna do something different. I'm curious about, hey, I was, I thought I was quite happy in this family unit and there was some conflict that needed to happen and now I'm getting therapy and now I'm out. When does the family turn around and go, Tom, you're a homewrecker? That's, that hasn't happened. And I'll tell you why.

If a person wants out from the family that predates me, that's due to criminal acts, or I call them sub-criminal acts, where there's chronic abuse, and that's when you know, this isn't my doing at all. I could spend an hour with that person and that's enough for them to go, actually, I'm out. But they were already out. They just didn't know it yet. But that hasn't happened. I work with three nervous systems, Shane: family, business colleague, asset owner, with my approach to therapy. The worst case that I've seen, and it's not even, I don't call it worst case, literally, but metaphorically is my client is outta the business, but now has a thriving relationship on the family side.

You know, I can think of clients where the son or the daughter said to the patriarch or the matriarch, because of therapy, I now know I don't wanna work with you. I'm so sorry, but I don't wanna work with you at all. But speaking as your son or your daughter, I love you and I want you coming to the house, playing with my kids as grandma or grandpa. And that is another magic moment where a client can differentiate between, am I speaking as a business colleague or as the owner of an asset or as blood?

So as a business colleague, asset owner and blood running a marketing business and COVID effectively puts the handbrake on it. Do you have to sack your brother? No. He's running it now, - Right? - Yes. No, when I left that agency, I still own shares in it, but he kept running it. And I went full force into psychotherapy. It goes back to my comment, my income plummeted, but my happiness skyrocketed and it's been up there since. And the income has tracked back, especially now with my family business therapy practice.

I have the privilege of working not just in Sydney, but also in Melbourne. I'm here working with business families, Brisbane, Hobart. So it's a real passion and with passion, money - follows. - Yeah. So it's an interesting pattern. You think about that. I was running a business, I've now exited, someone else in the family's running the business. I'm still a shareholder, but I'm not actively involved in it. Pretty typical family business pattern in certain respects. How does that play out when you're a shareholder that your brother's running it and you don't agree with the direction he's taken or some decision he's made or the way things are going now that you are exited, but on the periphery, does the family kid stuff bubble back up again and you want to headbutt each other or?

Well, he's doing very well. He's taken the consultancy in a different direction. He's running events now, very successful events. But yes, there are times when we talk, and he'll mention something and I'll, and you know, my original synaptic pairing, the original pattern will be, what were you thinking? You shouldn't be doing that. And he'll say, why are you telling what to do? And my therapy training kicks in and I'll go, one sec. Pause. I think I got a bit angry with you there. Let me just think about this.

I think I felt fear that you are going to not make this a profitable event and you'll be disappointed. And because I love you, my fear kind of grabbed me. But rather than sit with that, I just went straight to anger, which is how I learned. And that's where we can repair. It's an unusual way to talk. I was gonna say, how did your brother react to that as you go? What? Well, he gets therapy as well, so we're both of that open-mindedness. But now he doesn't call me up on that.

He appreciates that. But just last week I was presenting in a non-family business boardroom, training, or presenting to the team, senior business leaders about the power of emotions. And someone said to me, if I spoke that way, the whole boardroom would laugh at me and go, mate, why are you talking that way? Some might even think I'm weak. Something you just said then sparked something in my brain, went a million miles an hour in different direction. And it's funny, and the reflection was, I could, I couldn't say that in the boardroom.

People would laugh at me. I was 20 years in corporate roles before I decided to work for myself. Right. And what immediately sparked for me was I know I've sat in rooms back in the day and I'm curious, I actually now processing, am I curious? Do I still do it? Where someone will be mid-sentence saying something and they'll use a term or an acronym or something I'd never heard before. And I'm like, now I don't, I don't understand the rest of that sentence because you said something that didn't make sense to me, but I'm sure as shit not gonna put my hand up and out myself that I don't understand.

And I imagine that happens a lot. Maybe, at the risk of sounding like I'm looking for free therapy, I'm curious about why did I, why was I doing that? And now that I'm genuinely curious, I'm sitting here like asking you questions, going, I wanna learn more. Right now I'm not having any fear about asking a dumb questions. Almost the premise of the - show. I dunno. - Well, let me ask you, in that boardroom when you wanted to say to the person, hey, that thing you said, I don't quite understand it, but you held yourself back.

Holding yourself back is part of a pattern. It's not good or bad, you know, right or wrong, it's just a pattern. It was useful to you. How was it? The first question I wanna ask you is, how was it useful to you to hold yourself back from asking the clarifying question? That's the irony of it. Sitting there now going, that was - dumb. - Yes. Now, Now, but - then, - But in that moment, I'm not, how was it useful to you? I can only assume that my immediate reaction is, I don't wanna look stupid.

Yes. And if you looked stupid, what would be the emotion you'd feel? Shame, sadness, fear, Shame, I suppose - Probably shame. - Yeah. And what's wrong with... It feels danger, it felt dangerous to you. But if we look at shame, it's an emotion that nature hardwires into us because as cavemen, we need to belong to survive. It's a critical, it's sparky hardwiring in us. And shame is one of those survival emotions, because to feel shame is to feel disconnected, to feel you don't belong. And that's valuable.

Do you know why? So you don't get eaten - by a tiger or something? - Yeah. So you can go back into your tribe because the antidote to shame is to go back into your tribe and touch them, kiss them, hug them, talk to them. Shame is actually an adaptive emotion, but in your case it felt dangerous to feel shame. Yeah. I get that. And in our society, holding yourself back might be useful in that moment. But sitting here with me now, I think maybe you're thinking about that a bit more now.

Yeah. I was just made, the connection that occurred to me was, that's interesting. I've felt that before, but now I'm sitting here asking what would I actually, genuinely have no idea. Which is why I'm asking the questions. And it doesn't feel scary, but it's just two of us in a room. Okay. Derek's hiding over here. But you know, the two of us in the room as distinct from these are a bunch of people who are the, you know, executive leadership team of a multi-billion dollar business. And that's a proposition of outing yourself to that would be quite different to, I can just hit the delete button on something I just said to you and no one will ever know I said.

When my clients ask me that, I tell them two things can be true at the same time. You can feel shame or fear or sadness, even express it and not, but, and you can also state why you will persist in doing so. For example, in that moment you could have said, hey, team, I'm feeling shame asking this question 'cause I think you might think, I don't know what I'm talking about. But, George, I literally didn't understand what you meant by that. And it's important for me to ask you that clarifying question because I'm keen to work with you on this project.

That would be one way to feel and express the underlying emotion. And to then show persistence in why you are still sitting there and asking the question based on a core value. I mentioned this in the boardroom last week and I got better, but still exposes us in a business environment and it's one of the reasons I focus on family business because those discussions don't happen. Families are happy to talk to each other that way. So we still have a fair bit to go in non-family business to break that culture of emotions don't belong in the boardroom, be tough, look smart, gain respect.

Yeah, I don't think so. I'm gonna keep working on that. Something that comes up in my work occasionally when there's a genuine succession event, either is happening or going to happen. And I'll typically get engaged by one or the other. Typically the younger, the, call it, person succeeding to the business, the old man's run this thing, it's his baby. He says he wants to hand it over, but I'm not yet convinced he's ready. I'm, I think I'm ready. I wanna do this, but I'm not gonna do it the way he did.

I'm not gonna work 80 hours and miss time with my kids and I'm not doing everything on paper. And he doesn't understand the opportunity and the upside of being able to do all this digital stuff. And then it's almost, but he won't listen to me. Shane, you tell him. I'm like, I'm not gonna convince your old man that he's wrong and he's been doing things wrong forever and he needs to pay me money to give you what you need to take it over. That's not, shouldn't be my position either, but it's probably feels like it's the deflect to Shane because the dad, 'cause Dad won't listen to - me. - Well, what you just described there is a pattern called triangulation.

It's where the family business member grabs the adviser and triangulates by asking the adviser to do his or her bidding. And interestingly they're outsourcing their avoidance to you. Now, if you actually do that for them, you have been caught up in their pattern. A lot of advisers get sucked up into these patterns of the families they work with. So yeah, that's what came up for me just now. That what your client should do for their own growth and something that you could do with them or any adviser is role-play with them.

The actual request of you. So if you're, the request of you is, can you tell him, can you change his mind? You could say, well, let me role-play him. I'll act like him and you try to change my mind. And that's exposure work. And that's an opportunity. And I do that a lot of, in my own therapy with my, when I do therapy with my clients, I'm role-playing a lot. If it's a key pair, I get them to talk obviously things they've never talked about before. And for the, anyone listening who doesn't know what a key pair is, A key pair is, well, think of couples therapy, but a lot of them are not couples.

They're two brothers or uncle, nephew. So I call them key pairs because they're the key that, a key pair within the family business. So it could be mother, son, could be - Mother, son, - Siblings, - whatever. - Yeah. Or it could be someone who's non-family, it could be chairman and CEO. Non-family. Okay. Anyone within the family system, including non-family members, if they're critical to the family system that need to actually have those hard conversations that the boardroom just cannot hold. My takeaway was, Shane, it'd be useful you to role play this with them as the client, but that presupposes that I'm putting back on them.

You are gonna have this conversation with your old man, not me, which is fine. Step before that. How do I say that to them? You've asked me to come in here and help you, and now I'm telling you I'm not gonna do what you've asked me and I'm still want to work with you. How do I have that - conversation? - Well, as their adviser, if you believe that they should have that conversation directly. I mean, if you don't, if you are happy to do the triangulating, no judgement from me.

But if you do believe or agree with me that they should do it themselves as their adviser, I would lean on that and say, as your adviser, I care about you and your results. I'm advising you that you must speak to the patriarch directly. Oh, it hasn't worked before. I've tried a thousand times. Okay, well if we role-play, I'll play your dad and let's see the ways you've tried, and then you can give them direct feedback. I'm often giving direct feedback to my clients as the patriarch.

I'm saying, that made me feel like you don't know what you're talking about, or this makes me feel like you're being selfish or whatever it is. I'll say something that just comes up organically as if I'm that person I'm portraying, but because I'm their therapist, it's safe. They can hear hard stuff from me and know that in three minutes we're gonna sit down and I'm their therapist and I hold them in unconditional positive regard. Well, and equally, it's probably not a good idea for an adviser to try and pretend to be a psychotherapist if you're not trained.

Right? Well, yes. And even if you have training, if you go too far down that rabbit hole, you've created a dual relationship. Just like therapists should never date their clients or go into business with them, it's called the dual relationship. You have to avoid it at all costs because both relationships poison each other. It's roughly a similar idea with advisers working with families. If you go down the therapy kind of rabbit hole too deep, you may be overstepping the lane that you were retained for and causing confusion for both.

What's interesting for me is the takeaway that you, I mean, the role play you suggested was, okay, well, as I recall, I'll be your old man and try and convince me and let's play it out. My general reaction is to go, I can't have this argument with your dad for you, but you be your dad and let me ask you - to change things. - Love that. Yeah. And to tell me what your dad's objections are. 'Cause you've said you are, you've asked and tell me - what they are. - Yes.

You can role-play your client and they can portray their - dad. - Yeah. I, and that's only worked because I've then gone, right, so what are the typical objections you get back? And I'm like, well, let's work through those. Now you've got the ammunition, off you go, you gonna have your own - conversation. - When I do individual work, there's a technique I use a lot called empty chair. So I'll pull up an empty chair and invite my client to speak to the empty chair. And then the empty chair is the patriarch or the matriarch or anyone who's distressing them in the business.

And it's remarkable how they'll look at the empty chair and still tense up. Because these are synaptic pairings, Shane. These are embedded in our brains to protect us, but they become a rigid pattern. So even though no one's there and they're safe with me, they'll still tense up and I'll invite them to start speaking from different emotions, speak from anger, speak from shame, fear, sadness. And if my client is willing, I'll have them shift to that chair and speak from the other person's perspective. There could be a whole dialogue that goes on for 20 minutes via different emotions from both perspectives.

Incredibly awareness-raising. And when you said that you could have your client play the dad, that's brilliant. That's literally like what I do with chair work. Okay. So I wasn't getting it wrong. No, I think it's a very creative and clinically based approach. I was literally trying to figure out what his objections would be. So I'd give you the answer. I was, I wasn't trying to be particularly scientific about it. Mate, let's end it on that note, 'cause I think that's been a really interesting conversation. I appreciate you coming in and - sharing a coffee with you. - Thank you so much.

So as is tradition, a little bit about today's shout. As you notice, we were having a coffee, and today's coffee comes from Vittoria, a well-known family name. In fact, the Vittoria Coffee family was started by Italian immigrants in Sydney in 1947, who originally were bringing in imported European foods and started roasting their own Arabica coffee around 1958. The business today is run by the family's third generation, Les and Rolando Schirato. And to the Vittoria family, thank you very much. Thanks for listening to My Shout. It's been amazing having you on board.

If you like the show, I'd love for you to share it with your friends. Join us on the socials, hit the follow button, and let everyone know about these great family business transition stories. Thanks for listening.