to buy a house It is essential for family management in such circumstances to avoid being surrounded by the secondrate. The second approach raises quite different questions. This is the decision, by succeeding generations in a family firm which is well and truly established, to act as benevolent figureheads leaving the management to professionals. It calls for a very special kind of discipline, once this decision is taken, to avoid interfering with the management under these circumstances. 'After all,' the argument runs, 'I own the business so why the devil shouldn't I chivvy my management, keep them on their toes !', and so on. This can be a fatal attitude. An owner must feel free to ask questions and be kept briefed about what is going on, but if he nags and bullies he is breaking faith. This is often reflected in the creation of a certain type of manager who, with his 'anything for peace' philosophy, turns into a pale version of what a manager should be. The debt that is owed to the founder of a successful family business by succeeding generations is often best paid by the acceptance of one prime responsibility, that of finding efficient managers and then placing utmost confidence in them. And the acceptance of that responsibility can in itself be a complete justification for enjoying without guilt the fruits of the founder's efforts. A parttime, memberofthefamily chairman with wide outside interests in, for example, charitable or cultural fields can be a sheetanchor to a busy management. With the wisdom and detachment that comes from a wider view of life such a man or men can very often bring to management a fresh approach which, if management is wise, it will do well to study. This can be a twoway affair. In these days of shifting and uncertain loyalties there is much to be said for managements making the very most of family tradition and reputation in a business. It implies no loss of prestige or power when a nonfamily general manager or managing director adroitly uses the family representatives in the best interests bf the firm's development and as a means of giving employees a sense of belonging to something more defined than an impersonal machine. Paternalism needs, however, to be carefully and wisely handled. A chairman's letter to a man who has done thirty years' service can be a valuable and welcome aid to management, whereas the granting of a loan to someone in the typing pool in a branch office to meet an urgent need should be within the competence of the man on the spot. The danger lies in too great an emphasis on the 'family' as the fount of all wisdom and generosity. Most of the foregoing applies to middle and largesized familyowned firms. There is still the host of small businesses which account for a great part of Britain's industrial and commercial effort, and which in so many instances derive their stimulus and lead from family management. In fact ninety per cent of British firms employ 100 people or less and the family element in such enterprises must still be predominant. interior Planning