04 Apr April 4, 2025 – Family Businesses Ivan Lansberg and Flex Careers Christine Fruehwirth
Ivan Lansberg – Co-Founder at LGA and co-author of The Enduring Enterprise: How Family Businesses Thrive in Turbulent Conditions
Ivan Lansberg
Ivan Lansberg is the co-founder at LGA and co-author of The Enduring Enterprise: How Family Businesses Thrive in Turbulent Conditions, with Devin DeCiantis. About the book: While blue chips, tech titans, and big banks are often hailed as the leading drivers of modern capitalism, it turns out that family businesses are not only more pervasive but also more enduring. This is particularly true in emerging and frontier economies, where the bulk of the world’s growth in population and economic activity will be generated in the years and decades to come. Though only one-fifth of Fortune 500 companies are family-controlled, enterprising families in these environments account for up to 90 percent of all business activity and employment. They not only survive but actually thrive under the constant threat of war, environmental disaster, and market failures, and have lessons to teach businesses and leaders everywhere about building and sustaining success in the face of crisis and uncertainty. Through vivid case studies and building on decades of personal experience, they share a unique portfolio of seven stabilizing strategies that can help any organization increase its resilience and performance. These include a Peruvian family that built a global soft drink empire from the ground up during an active terrorist conflict; a Korean family best known for exporting dried fish before being tapped by the government to help modernize the country; a Syrian family who relaunched their international manufacturing conglomerate after having their assets unceremoniously seized by a military coup, among countless others. Leveraging insights from the domains of management science, economics, history, biology, and systems theory, DeCiantis and Lansberg make clear that companies operating in advanced economies are no longer immune to the many structural shocks and frequent crises that are haunting our daily news cycle. As a result, they argue that the best chance at coping with elevated volatility is to adopt a more proactive and preemptive approach to managing risk—like the many enterprising families who have flourished in complex frontier environments for decades and even centuries. This perspective represents a new strategic mindset: building businesses that can navigate an ever-changing landscape, not just chase the next shiny new trend. As owners and leaders start embracing this new logic and outperforming their growth-obsessed peers, they predict that a fascinating trend will emerge. Business leaders everywhere will increasingly trade in their current high priests of efficiency and growth—the likes of Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos—for enduring enterprises who have learned to thrive in all seasons. Having survived countless crises, such frontier family businesses have the upper hand when it comes to predicting the subtle tremors that precede an economic avalanche, as well as reading the shifting winds across the political and environmental landscape. By studying their stories and applying their timeless wisdom, we can all be better equipped to face the many new dangers and opportunities that lie ahead. A critical read in a world of uncertainty, THE ENDURING ENTERPRISE provides a new set of tools and inspirational examples that will guide business leaders through the toughest conditions.
Christine Fruehwirth – Founder of FlexCareers Consulting and Author of
Christine Fruehwirth
Christine Fruehwirth has had more than 20 years of career counseling and life coaching experience through her successful business, FlexCareers Consulting. Her focus and passion has consistently been helping stay-at-home parents return to the workplace and working parents who are looking for more balance in their lives. From 2009 to 2019, Christine also worked as a Career Consultant and Instructor of a Career Management Strategy course at George Washington University, and most recently at Georgetown University in Washington D.C. During her years working in higher education, she developed an expertise in helping undergraduates of all majors recruit for and successfully obtain internships and full time positions in the Financial Services industry. She spent a decade in that industry focused on consumer and later investment banking, working for major financial institutions including Bank of America, Capital One and Wells Fargo. Her last few years in the industry were spent at Lending Tree on the senior leadership team.