example, the sisters describe learning not to make shortcuts in life through their favourite breakfast, egg custard. For the next generation, cooking carries emotional weight and is where knowhow is embedded. Children learn the ways of the family, even if the lessons are embedded in practical everyday matters, with no intention of developing successors. BUSINESS CONNECTIONS As the sisters grew older, there was a greater connection between cooking and business, and they came to better appreciate continuing the family legacy. Living in a family that works in the culinary business, knowledge of that business in inevitably passed on through cooking. Helen and Lisa recall shopping for ingredients both for dinner and for the business, gaining an understanding of good and bad ingredients in the process. On these trips, the family talk about the tricks of the trade, and these are captured in the cookbooks. The children learn to cook for family and business – by the age of 11 they say they could cook the entire takeaway menu – and it is normal for them to learn lessons from cooking that apply to the business. In the cookbooks, they say: “I always enjoyed family dinners when I was growing up, not only for the good hearty food but also for the stories and running commentaries about the business and day-to-day life.” NEW LEADERS Finally, when the next generation lead the business, having completed what might be seen as the traditional process of succession, cooking became a form of leading. For the sisters, cooking has been and is part of their family life, interwoven with business. They are convinced that simply continuing to cook is not enough – a business in needed. It was up to them to ‘continue the family culinary journey’. The sisters can influence the business and innovate, continuing the family legacy and introducing personal features. They create new recipes and add personal touches, seeking external recognition and maintaining a high profile that achieved national and even international recognition not seen by previous generations. You can see this with how they have promoted the business. Sweet Mandarin won the Best Chinese Restaurant prize on Gordon Ramsay’s popular TV show, The F Word, and the sisters subsequently won £50,000 on the show Dragon’s Den. PATH TO SUCCESSION Through all the stories within the cookbooks we can see how family practices such as cooking carry socialisation between generations in a way that prepares the next generation to continue the family’s culture, history and values. Succession here was not planned rationally. It was an ongoing process, taking place over decades outside of the business, even while the parents do not want it to happen. Families planning succession might use similar practices to cooking to help develop successors purposefully. The evidence we found shows how the next generation can become more willing and committed to the cause through such everyday practices it might be easy to ignore. FIFTY FOUR DEGREES | 49 Dr Bingbing Ge is a Lecturer in the Department of Entrepreneurship and Strategy, and a member of the Centre for Family Business. The article An Entrepreneurship- as-practice perspective of nextgeneration becoming family businesses successors: the role of discursive artefacts, by Dr Bingbing Ge and Professor Eleanor Hamilton, of Lancaster University Management School; and Dr Kajsa Haag, of Jönköping University, is published in the journal Entrepreneurship & Regional Development. b.ge1@lancaster.ac.uk
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