Recently, a rather smart, beautiful young lady contacted me about her fiancé’s family business. Her future father-in-law – who owns the business – is overbearing and treats his son – her fiancé – poorly, failing to compensate him and not following through on promises to relinquish control. Even though the father has gifted significant numbers of non-voting shares to his three sons and one daughter, the other three siblings have long since left the business because they can’t get along with their dad. 

In most family owned businesses – whether Christian or not – there is usually an enmeshment of roles for family members who work in the business. They confuse the four roles that anyone can play in a corporation: