Call to support family firm sector ahead of IFB event
Hundreds of family businesses are to gather north of the Border this week as a key event focused on and advocating for the sector comes to Glasgow for the first time.
The annual Institute For Family business(ifb) national family business conference kicks off on Wednesday, with the three day event expected to see family firms of all sizes meet to discuss the future of this type of business model and how such firms innovate and invest to support the next generation of organisations.
The IFB says the conference will showcase Scottish family business success stories – adding that north of the Border there are more than 280,000 family firms, around 84 percent of all businesses in the nation.
Exclusive research commissioned by the IFB and produced by census wide, which obtained the views of more than 2,000 respondents in late May, found the British public find familyrun businesses to be the most trustworthy companies (25.4 per cent) when compared to PLCS (14.7 per cent), private equity backed-companies (9.8 per cent), and venture capital firms (7.6 per cent). The poll also found the public thought family businesses – along with employee-owned organisations – looked after their employees the most compared to other business models.
The IFB added that in 2020, family businesses across the whole of the UK boosted the economy by £575 billion, and employed 13.9 million people, which it said means family firms comprised 85.9 per cent of all UK firms, directly generated 44.4 percent of gross domestic product, and were responsiblefor just over half of all private sector employment that year.
The conference attendees will hear how a thriving family business sector is essential to achieving a more prosperous society with long-term sustainable growth. The organisation’s boss Neil Davy welcomed what he said is theuk’ sbigg est family business conference making its maiden appearance in glasgow, adding: “For too long, political, industry and business decision making has taken a restricted approach to investment decisions that responds to priorities of non-family business PLCS, whose priority is to meet shareholder demands for short-term returns on investments.”