Biography
A principal of The Family Business Consulting Group, Inc.®, Christopher Eckrich specializes in building leadership excellence and maintaining family unity in family owned businesses. He assists family owned firms in establishing orderly succession plans that maximize effective leadership transition and prevent conflict during the transition. He also provides family business members with skills and strategies to successfully manage working relationships and reduce the inherent conflict that is present when family members work together.
Chris's family history of entrepreneurship in meat processing and other industries provided the impetus for his commitment to the family business field. His clients include family businesses and other closely held firms from a wide variety of business sectors. He has presented at national conferences and regularly gives seminars and workshops on succession planning, leadership building, managing relationships, and preventing conflict in family owned firms. Chris was awarded the Family Firm Institute's 1994 Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award for his research on family business dynamics, and now serves on several review committees for the Family Firm Institute. He is published in the Family Business Review, Nation's Business, and often writes for newspapers and business publications to assist those who work together with families.
As an adjunct faculty member at The University of Notre Dame, Chris has taught Family Enterprise, and occasionally lectures there. He also served as a founding advisor to The Family Business Center at the University of St. Francis, a university-based education center for family business owners and their families, where he lead the Next Generation Leaders group.
Chris received a B.B.A. in organizational behavior from Notre Dame and earned both a master's degree and Ph.D. from Purdue University.
Chris and his wife, Carol Ann, live in Ft. Wayne, Indiana with their three young children. They are actively involved in their community and their church in a variety of leadership activities.
Dr. Eckrich may be reached at eckrich@efamilybusiness.com.
Testimonials
"Chris is a fabulous presenter! His demeanor is calming, yet he absolutely has a commanding presence and keeps everyone in the audience involved. He has lots of really good stories and his trust level is very, very high."
Belmont University
Lindsey Trella, Director
"Chris communicates very effectively and elicits lots of audience participation. I thought he was an excellent speaker. Your group (The Family Business Consulting Group, Inc.®) always does a good job for us."
Uniform and Textile Services Association
Jon Shonerd, Director
"Chris Eckrich delivered a well conceived, impassioned call to family business
owners to develop an action plan to prevent conflict and build harmony in order to achieve successful family relationships while perpetuating their businesses. His effective use of the case study stimulated discussion and helped build trust among the group. Clearly, Chris works to build successful family businesses as well as energize those of us in university programs to provide the best possible service--a win-win for family businesses!"
Indiana Family Business Forum, Indiana University
Carol Sauerhoff, Coordinator
Topics
- Building Harmony in the Family Business...And Keeping It!
- The Art of Running Family Meetings.
- The Family, the Business, and Each One of Us: How Do I Balance All of This?
- Building Family Business Policies.
- Building Effective Sibling & Cousin Teams.
- Motivating Key Employees in the Family Firm.
- Developing Leaders in the Next Generation.
- The Secret to Family Business Success: Psst...Pass it on!
- The Psychology of Family Business Estate Planning.
- Family Business Transitions.
- Best Practices in Family Businesses.
Background
- Principal of The Family Business Consulting Group, Inc.®.
- Regular speaker at association and university forum events.
- Columnist for a variety of regional and national business publications.
- Founding advisory board member for the Family Business Center at the University of St. Francis.
- Research published in the Family Business Review.
- Facilitator of Next Generation Leadership meetings.
- Specializes in conflict prevention and resolution, working with adult and sibling teams.
- Adjunct faculty, University of Notre Dame.
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