The Next-gen Wealth study by the Politecnico di Milano found that 72% of Millennials are already involved in the family business, although often in marginal roles. In practical terms, what is preventing a genuine transfer of responsibilities from the senior generation to the junior one?
The most common challenge we observe in family businesses is the tendency to confuse presence with responsibility. The younger generation is there—they attend meetings, know the business, and are involved in day-to-day activities—but decision-making remains firmly in the hands of the senior generation. Our research confirms this: only 15% of families manage both the business and their wealth in a genuinely shared way across generations. While 47% of Millennials are involved in some strategic decisions, most are still not truly included in the decisions that matter most. The main obstacle is psychological.
Those who have built a business through years of hard work find it hard to imagine that the same business could be run any differently than they have run it. They seek successors who think and make decisions like the founders, ignoring the fact that the market has changed and that the qualities that worked yesterday are not necessarily the ones that will be needed tomorrow. Added to this is the difficulty of stepping away from a role that, for many entrepreneurs, is synonymous with their very identity.
Young people need to develop their skills and earn the trust of their colleagues gradually, but the organization expects them to command authority simply by virtue of being part of the owner family. It is a difficult balance to strike, one that can only be achieved through structured paths of increasing responsibility.
His research shows that younger generations view corporate heritage not only as an economic lever but also as an extension of their own identity. To what extent does this shift in mindset impact the governance of family-owned businesses in the agri-food sector, where supply-chain values and a sense of place are an integral part of the brand?
In family-run agri-food businesses, the product is rarely just a product. It is a story, a region, and a way of working passed down through the generations. This connection is an extraordinary competitive advantage, but it hides a pitfall: if the family’s identity is too deeply rooted in tradition, questioning it can be perceived as a betrayal.
The younger generations bring not only fresh energy but also new perspectives on the market that older generations often lack, because they don’t use the same channels, don’t experience the same consumer contexts, and don’t hear the same conversations. Creating spaces for dialogue and collaborating on strategic decisions is one of the most important choices a family-owned agri-food business can make today. Those who succeed in transforming the values they already practice into a shared narrative with the younger generations will find in them the most credible guardians and the most effective promoters of that identity.
