What to do if your children don't want to take over

Many owners never ask directly, and many children never say no directly. Have the conversation explicitly, with a real timeframe attached, so nobody spends five years assuming.

A polite maybe is a no. Plan accordingly.

A management buy-out, often funded partly by the business itself. An employee ownership trust. A sale to a trade buyer, investor or private owner. Or a hybrid where a manager takes a stake alongside an external buyer.

Each has different tax treatment and different demands on the team, so take advice early.

The thing you actually want to survive is the reputation, the standard of work and the livelihoods of the people who helped build it.

A committed outside owner can carry that further than a reluctant family successor. We have seen both, and enthusiasm matters more than surname.