Family Business Matters: Recent Episodes
UToledo Family Business Center
With over 235 family and privately-held businesses, the University of Toledo Family Business Center offers benefits that include access to local, regional, and nationally recognized business experts and affiliates. This podcast highlights this expertise on a variety of business and family-business-related topics -- enjoy!
Joins us as we dive into the dynamic world of Affinity Groups at our special event co-hosted by the UToledo Family Business Center and Sylvia van Meerten and Jack Schott from ForumWithin. We're spotlighting the game-changing potential of our Affinity Groups to forge strong connections and boost efficiency.
Join the UToledo Family Business Center and Family Enterprise USA for a webinar on the results of the FEUSA 2023 Annual Family Business Survey. FEUSA's Pat Soldano and John Gugliada discuss the current Washington, DC landscape and provide a legislative update on tax policy issues impacting successful families, family offices, and family businesses in the 118th Congress. The webinar also addresses voter attitudes influencing legislation and the newly formed Congressional Family Business Caucus.
Family Enterprise USA is the organization that represents all family businesses on a national level in DC; it is not unique to any industry. Family Enterprise USA‘s purpose is to promote family businesses, generationally owned businesses, and multigenerational businesses, and their job growth in America. They also support the work of Family Business Centers across the country.
Join the UToledo Family Business Center and Communica, Inc for a webinar on Demystifying Marketing: The Role of AI and ChatGPT in Business. In this informative session, you'll gain valuable insights into the seismic shifts taking place in the world of AI, ChatGPT, and related technologies, and how they're transforming the way businesses approach marketing their products and services.
Led by John Edwards, EVP and Partner at Communica, Inc, this webinar provides you with practical and actionable advice on how to start leveraging these cutting-edge tools to more effectively and efficiently engage with your prospects and customers.
As the saying goes, "change is the only constant in life." This is particularly true in estate planning, which undergoes continuous evolution. Join the UToledo Family Business Center and Center Sponsor Shumaker for a presentation by partner Dave Rectenwald and team members Nic Linares and Jack Kelly, who will discuss several current, pending, and potential changes to estate and succession planning. The presentation will discusses the recent changes in federal pension distributions and how they could affect existing revocable trusts; the recent changes to Ohio law, including those relating to post-nuptial agreements; the 2026 sunset to the 2018 Tax Act that is prompting a flood of large taxable gifts of closely-held interests and other assets and a summary of President Biden’s tax plan that could dramatically impact all gifting and succession planning.
Join the UToledo Family Business Center and Center Sponsor Fifth Third Private Bank for a panel discussion with their national specialists on topics and examples from across the country on ways to think about and ultimately protect your personal and business risk in unpredictable times. Key takeaways from the presentation include:
- Understanding why a good planning foundation can protect and empower your loved ones.
- Benefits of creating and evaluating an infrastructure to protect and transfer assets.
- Insights on coordinated advice to ensure your impact is fluid and financially efficient.
- Discussion on potentially difficult life situations that can be mitigated via risk protection annual reviews.
Business leaders recognize the talent that veterans can bring to an organization and consistently express a desire to hire and retain veterans. Yet, 65% of veterans leave their civilian organizations within the first 24 months. Surveys say that pay and benefits are the problem, but the research by the consultants at Mission Next revealed a more complicated problem. Veterans leave because they picked a job that wasn’t a good fit for them. So what can business leaders do to attract highly-qualified veterans to their organizations, and how can they build a culture where veterans want to stay and perform?
Inflation and recession fears are top of mind for everyone. When will it happen and how long is it going to last? And with everything happening in the world, what can be expected for our businesses and families in the future?
At this Webinar, Center sponsor Huntington will share information on the current state of the economy, and provide an outlook of the future. Specific discussion topics include:
- Will we enter into a recession? Are we in one now?
- Is now the time to invest?
- Is now the time to expand my business?
- When will inflation cool?
Join us for this important and timely Webinar. While there is uncertainty in the marketplace, there may be underlying opportunities!
If you own all or part of a business, you should know about buy-sell agreements. A business buy-sell agreement is created to protect from certain events, the most common of which are often referred to as the five D’s: death, disability, divorce, departure (either voluntary or involuntary), and disqualification. The agreement structure can vary, and the owners of a company, with guidance from legal and financial professionals, can determine which structure best fits their needs.
Join the UToledo Family Business Center and Skylight Financial Group for a Webinar on Buy-Sell Planning presented by Todd McGee, JD, LLM from MassMutual. The Webinar will cover the following:
- Various buy sell scenarios via four unique case studies
- Different types of buy sell designs/options
- Need for an agreement
- Possible tax implications
- Best means to help fund the agreements
Once you have made the choice to explore a potential sale or acceptance of investment from outside persons, how do you prepare your company for the process?
Join the UToledo Family Business Center and Shumaker for a webinar to review the best practices for readying your company for market and the transaction process, including:
- Negotiating agreements with investment bankers or brokers to market your business for sale.
- Reviewing and updating business agreements and processes to maximize value in the sale process.
- Review and adoption of executive/key employee agreements and compensation for high value employees’ continued employment post-transaction.
- Accepting private equity investment and participating in future roll-up and acquisition increases in value.
- Full disposition of your ownership and transitioning to a fixed temporary employment.
- Earn-outs, contingent additional purchase price amounts and other considerations in the negotiated purchase price.
Within the next 10 years, 80% of business owners plan to exit their business; yet only 17% have a written plan in place.
Exit planning is not just a plan. It is a strategy that evolves and adapts over time, and should be developed well before the exit occurs. That way the business can be transitioned on the owner’s terms, when they are ready. If you don’t have a plan in place, need a refresher, or have specific questions about your own exit plan, please join the UToledo Family Business Center and Fifth Third Bank at this Webinar covering all aspects of exit strategies, including:
- Short-term, regularly updated contingency plans
- Development of an exit strategy
- Consideration of inside & outside parties to succession, such as partners, key employees, family, private equity, and others
- Financing Options
- SBA - 504 and 7(a) structures
- ESOP’s
Employers are being inundated with information about “The Great Resignation”. No employer is exempt, yet some are worse off than others. What do employees really want? What can you do to attract and retain your most critical resource — “The People”? Join the UToledo Family Business Center and Hylant, as we hear Deborah Bubp (Chief Talent Officer, Hylant), as well as, others from the Hylant team, share their own story of how a privately held family-owned company continues to focus on the employee experience during this unique time. The webinar will discuss the following:
The “Great Quit”
- Why are employees making a change and what differentiators are they seeking?
Leading a workforce in a time of change and making the right investments in your people
- What makes you a “sticky” employer?
- Prioritizing and making the right investments in your people
- Hear more about the Hylant story
We've all heard horror stories about businesses being hijacked with ransomware, the software behind cyber extortion, and the hazards of business email compromise (BEC). According to an FBI report, businesses paid out $1.8 billion dollars in 2020 due to BEC, and with more people working from home, businesses are under attack! The UToledo Family Business Center and Huntington Bank hosted a webinar to discuss:
Business Email Compromise (BEC)
· Difference between phishing and BEC
· BEC tactics
· BEC Case Study
· Detecting BEC Red flags
· Best Practices
Ransomware Prevention
· What is Ransomware
· What does it look like
· Responding to Ransomware
· Other Impacts and the increasing threat
· Cybersecurity Ransomware Prevention
· What to do if you are a victim
Eric Kripke, writer, producer and showrunner of Emmy nominated shows The Boys and Supernatural is interviewed (over Zoom) by his brother Matt Kripke, CEO of Kripke Enterprises in Toledo, about what it is like to be in the television business. Spoiler alert: many of the HR issues are the same no matter what industry you are in! They’ll also discuss their strong connection to their family business, and how it’s influenced their work and their lives, even on different career paths.
Looming changes to income taxes, capital gains taxes and estate taxes may pose big burdens to family businesses. At this Webinar, Center sponsor, The William Vaughan Company, will review the following legislation and go over what this means for you and your business. And more importantly, what steps you can take now to protect your interests and way of life.
- Increase in tax rates, both corporate and individual
- Increase in capital gains rate
- Broader application of the NIIT
- Limitation on the Qualified Business Income Deduction for high income individuals
- Elimination of the "back-door" Roth contributions for high income individuals
- Possible SALT cap repeal
Careful, advanced planning is your best defense against the proposed tax implications.
Recently a local brewery made headlines after a visit from a political candidate and a tweet that ignited a firestorm of criticism. Today’s crises are fast and furious, can seemingly come out of nowhere, and nobody is immune. After all, the trends and key moments of 2020 have created a climate for quick-hitting and damaging crises that are emotionally charged.
However, most companies – especially those that are local and/or believe they’re immune – are at the most risk for a moment that could truly be crippling for a business. This conversation, facilitated by Mike Hart and Jeff Lutz, with Center member Hart, is designed to analyze the current business climate temperature and discuss ways to prepare your business for these quickly evolving crises.
We hope you never find yourself in such a crisis, but if you do, the best chance to get through it is to be prepared ahead of time.