Our latest insights

Inflation can create tough situations for family businesses, with increased costs and pricing dilemmas. It's important for family businesses to have strategies in place to tackle these challenges, allowing them to thrive.

As a Trustee (the person who manages the fund) you have many obligations you must adhere to once your self-managed super fund (SMSF) is setup.

At Grant Thornton, we offer a National Superannuation team to support you and your family with the accumulation phase right through to retirement.

When it comes to family governance, we often recommend introducing a formal family governance structure while the second generation is being transitioned into the business.

In a family business, it is crucial to have a shareholder agreement to ensure there is consensus on key issues, to provide clarity, and to minimise the risk of conflict between family members – before issues arise.

When you’re a family business, the lines between business and family can become blurred. For some family businesses in operation for multiple generations, this is even more apparent as the family business may be all they’ve ever known.

To ensure your assets will be protected should you become unable to make financial decisions due to an accident or bad health, we recommend your Estate Plan includes an Enduring Power of Attorney.

Generally, when we talk with family businesses about the next generation ‘taking over’ we break this down into two parts – management and ownership. Every business – like every family – is different and what this means in one family business may be completely different in another.

It is not uncommon for parents to advance their children money. What the funds are used for may be a significant consideration in how the transfer may be structured from the family business entity, or group of entities, as there may be several financial, taxation and legal consequences.

It is evident the pandemic created many challenging situations for CEOs where they were required to act quickly on problems their business faced. But is it now time to stop, reflect and reassess? As we near the end of the year where we become fatigued, the effects of the pendulum can start to surface, and these issues should be addressed.

You may think that your business is too small to target – too insignificant to warrant the attention of the widely publicised cyber-criminal groups that chase multimillion dollar ransoms. In reality, a large number of criminal groups exist around the world, exploiting the entire spectrum of online activity.

Sibling rivalry is the type of dispute that can be destructive when it comes to making decisions in your family business, so it is important to have strategies in place to mitigate conflict.