Ermias Mebrate Mengistu leads the IESE Africa Initiative, launched in 2009 to promote Africa-focused research, programs, exchange modules and faculty development on the continent.
On an April morning in Addis Ababa, a group of Ethiopian family business leaders gathered at WeVenture Hub.
There was no podium or formal presentation—just coffee and a guest with an unusual depth of lived experience: Stijn Swinkels, Chief Growth Officer of Royal Swinkels Family Brewers.
Organized by IESE’s Africa Initiative, the event was part of the school’s ongoing efforts to promote learning and build bridges between African and international business communities.
From an implicit understanding to a family protocol
Royal Swinkels is a family-owned company founded in the Netherlands in 1719.
Long before establishing a family charter, the company was guided by an implicit understanding between parents and children: each generation was expected to grow the business and pass it on—not to extract value from it, not to sell it, but to steward it.
This unwritten principle held for over two centuries, through two world wars and successive waves of market disruption.
But as the pace of change accelerated, differences in interpretation began to emerge among family members, leading the company to formalize its rules around 40 years ago.
Today, Royal Swinkels has over 300 shareholders—all family members—and a family charter that governs the three systems at the heart of family business: family, business and ownership.
As Swinkels emphasized, the document put previously unanswered questions into writing and created a framework to address conflict—something that, in its absence, could harm both the business and the family.
The rules, he noted, must be transparent and fair to every family member.
A framework for conflict resolution
Conflict is inevitable within a family business. Families that wait for harmony before establishing formal rules have already waited too long.
Every disagreement, if handled well, offers an opportunity to challenge unspoken assumptions and define principles that will guide the family in the future.
Swinkels was equally emphatic about the importance of regular, deliberate family time—not board meetings, but gatherings aimed at nurturing the human connections that no governance charter can replace.
Group trips for family members to tour the Habesha Breweries facilities were among the examples he shared. For many, these visits provide a first exposure to Ethiopia, as well as a chance to experience Ethiopian culture and build closer ties with relatives they rarely see.
At the same time, the company promotes an intangible asset that no governance structure can replace: a sense of connection among family members that facilitates honest communication and makes conflict—when it comes, as it always does—easier to work through together.
Reinvention as discipline
Governance and culture alone do not explain 300 years of success. Swinkels also highlighted reinvention as a critical driver of long-term success, not merely as a response to crises, but as a discipline embedded in the family business.
Over the years, Royal Swinkels has continuously entered new markets and restructured its operations without relinquishing family ownership. For the business leaders in attendance, the message was clear: building a business is not the same as sustaining one.
Enduring owner families are those that develop both the habit and the courage to question the status quo—giving the next generation room to experiment and accepting that not all initiatives will succeed.
The risk of growing without guardrails
Bekele Molla Hotels offers a contrasting Ethiopian example of the risks that can emerge when a founder’s entrepreneurial legacy is not met by equally clear governance structures.
A well-known figure in Ethiopia, Molla left his hometown for Mojo in 1924 with just 16 birr in his pocket—the money his mother had given him for the train fare. By the time he reached his destination, he had already turned his modest funds into a small profit by trading eggs and chickens.
His entrepreneurial drive and commercial success did not stop there: in 1942, he opened his first hotel, then another, until his properties dotted the landscape across Ethiopia’s Great Rift Valley.
Honored with the Haile Selassie I Prize Trust Award for Industry in 1970, Molla had built Ethiopia’s largest hotel chain by the time he died in 2000.
After his death, the business faced a challenge familiar to founder-led family enterprises: how to transform entrepreneurial success into institutions capable of guiding ownership, leadership and reinvestment across generations.
While some of the hotels still stand, Molla’s empire has a far quieter presence today.
What this means for Ethiopia
History and cultural identity run deep in Ethiopia, where family enterprises serve as a core economic engine.
As these examples show, owner families can strengthen their long-term continuity when they put rules in writing, clarify ownership expectations, establish conflict-resolution mechanisms, create space for dialogue and revisit those rules as the family grows.
By adopting this proactive approach, they can strengthen the long-term continuity of the family business far beyond the founder’s lifetime.
Homepage image: Steve Enoch on Unsplash