How China's family businesses can bridge the generation gap

Significant responsibilities but with little control or authority. Uncertain title and no written job description. Little or no company-specific training. Compensation to be determined by a demanding boss who has excessive emotional involvement with the business and seeks to maintain a highly personal relationship with you. Possibilities for future advancement unclear and dependent on senior management's whims or unplanned events.

In return, long hours and a lifetime commitment will be required. You will also need to take extreme care in your interactions with the senior generation, your siblings, cousins, in-laws and maybe a board of directors. In addition, your performance will significantly affect your life, your children's future, your family relationships and your long-term financial well-being.

That's the situation second-generation members of families that run businesses often face.

Luo Zhong is a successful entrepreneur who, with his sister and brother, has built their manufacturing firm based in Ningbo, Zhejiang province, to sales of over 800 million and a staff of 4,000 employees.

He is 58 years old and had always assumed his son and only child would someday succeed him as chief executive and majority shareholder. He sent the boy to the best US schools to prepare him for a business career, but his son is now talking about joining an internet start-up with two of his university friends.

The senior Luo is concerned that his talented son appears uninterested in working with him in the family business.