Interview with Ellen Frankenberg

Family businesses are always challenging, but especially during the holidays, and Ellen talks with Jim about some of the things families who work together can grow closer during the holidays, or at least not hurt each other.

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Ellen and Jim celebrate her 8th anniversary of being on the show by talking about what it takes to successfully transition a family business from one generation to the next.
Ellen and Jim talk about how to deal with alcoholism at work. How to detect it and how to help those who are alcoholics. They also provide a phone number to call for help.
Ellen and Jim celebrate Family Business Week by talking about some of the secrets of success of family businesses, including having the children go to work somewhere else before they join the family firm full time.
Ellen joins Jim to discuss how to overcome differences in your family business.
Dr. Frankenberg joins Jim to talk about the extra degree of difficulty that is added to a small business operation when family members are directly involved. One of the tools Ellen offers is to follow the "straight line" method of communicating, which is to deal directly with the person involved, rather than relying on a third individual to relay information. They move on to talk about "family norms".