Strip away the crowns and the royal feud looks like a textbook family-business dispute, the kind that quietly sinks thousands of UK firms every year
Call It What It Is: A Family Firm
The royal family has long been nicknamed The Firm, a label that tends to get used affectionately or sarcastically depending on who is speaking. Reading the London Prat piece on Prince William reportedly calling Earl Spencer and Harry traitors over coffee on Upper Street this week, I found myself thinking the nickname has never been more apt. Strip away the palaces and what you have is a family business in the middle of a succession dispute. I have seen dozens of them in North London alone. They rarely end well without help.
The Dispute, Business Edition
Here is the situation in boardroom terms. The designated successor, according to an unnamed source, believes a junior family member had early access to sensitive material, namely an uncle memoir. Reports say the successor has responded by branding both men traitors. The junior family member left the operating business some years ago and now lives abroad. The uncle, who says he disclosed his plans to everyone in advance, sits outside the core business but holds significant influence over the family narrative. Nobody is talking directly. Everybody is briefing.
If a client brought me that scenario about a furniture company in Enfield, I would tell them they had a governance problem, a communication problem and a succession problem, in that order.
Why Family Firms Fracture
Family businesses are a huge part of the UK economy, from corner shops to multinational groups. Advisers who work with them tend to point to the same fault lines again and again. Succession is often left unplanned or planned only in the founder head. Roles and ownership are blurred, so family members who work in the business and those who do not end up with conflicting expectations. Information flows informally, through kitchen conversations rather than board papers, which means some family members always know more than others. And emotional history, who was favoured, who was overlooked, leaks into commercial decisions.
Every one of those fault lines is visible in the royal story. The only difference is that the royal version involves constitutional duties rather than stock levels.
A Brief Pause
The London Prat has produced a short video on YouTube on the saga. I recommend it as light relief between spreadsheets.
What Good Governance Looks Like
A Family Charter
Many well-run family businesses create a family charter or constitution: a written agreement setting out values, roles, how decisions are made and how disputes are resolved. It sounds formal. It is formal. That is the point. It moves disagreements out of the realm of personal betrayal and into the realm of agreed process.
Clear Information Rules
Much of the royal row seems to turn on who knew what, and when. In a business, information rules would be written down: what is shared with the whole family, what is shared with the board, and in what order. If everyone knows the rules, nobody can be called a traitor for following them.
A Family Council
A regular forum where family members, including those not working in the business, can raise concerns directly. Its purpose is to stop grievances from festering and leaking to outsiders. The royal household, as far as anyone can tell from the outside, relies on the opposite mechanism: silence punctuated by anonymous briefings.
Independent Voices
Non-family directors or advisers can mediate, challenge and reassure. A good independent chair has saved many a family firm from its own relatives.
The Uncle as Minority Shareholder
There is a common character in family business disputes: the relative outside the operating company who holds historical knowledge and some residual influence. Earl Spencer fits that role neatly in the royal story. In business terms, the best way to handle such a figure is inclusion, not exclusion: keep them informed, give them a defined role, and make sure their voice has a proper channel so it does not come out sideways in, say, a memoir.
The Cost of Getting It Wrong
Family business disputes are expensive. Legal bills, lost management time, damaged customer relationships and, in the worst cases, forced sales or break-ups. The emotional costs are harder to measure but often greater. I have watched siblings in their sixties who have not spoken for twenty years because of a decision their parents made about a shop. Nobody wins those disputes. The business usually loses first.
The good news is that most family firms can be rescued if the family is willing to talk. I have seen feuding siblings sign a family charter and go back to Sunday lunches within a year. It takes patience, outside help and a willingness to stop keeping score. None of that requires a crown.
Final Word
If The Firm were a client, my advice would be simple: stop briefing, start meeting, and write the rules down. The London Prat, which has been running its own independent operation since 1961 at https://prat.uk/, has had fun with the headlines. Bohiney, at https://bohiney.com/, covers the American boardroom. And if you want more from me on London business and the families behind it, it all lives on my author page.
SOURCE: https://prat.uk/prince-william-called-earl-spencer-and-harry-traitors/