Okeili & Co. Completes Family Business Governance for Abdullathif Alissa Group
Founded by Abdullathif Alissa, Abdullathif Alissa Group holding, the dealers of General Motors and Isuzu in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, has created a legacy in the Saudi automotive industry. Overseeing four synergetic business units ranging from automotive dealership to retail, financing, rental and leasing, the group has more than fifty years track record of remarkable success and superior customer service reputation in the kingdom. The group today is still owned by Alissa family, which has transitioned from one generation to another, growing to more than seventy-five family members and four succeeding generations.
WHAT WAS ALISSA OBJECTIVE?
In pursuit of evading the typical family business dilemmas pertaining to control, decision making, leadership, and wealth management, Alissa family has made a very conscious decision, which very few in the region have opted to undertake so far. The family has engaged Okeili & Co. to establish a family business governance framework, built around the family and the family business, in order to preserve Alissa Family unity and promote the sustainability of their legacy business. The aim of engaging Okeili & Co. was to inaugurate a robust governance framework with the enabling constitution, which can empower Alissa family as a whole to gain a common sense of direction, foster communication, communicate a shared vision and values, stimulate wealth creation, and last but not least develop and educate next-generation family members to prepare them for succession.
“Our experiences with Okeili& Co. exceeded our expectations. Mr. Okeili facilitated our 3rd generation family members to lead the process with the support of Alissa Group shareholders from the 2nd generation building on well surveyed best practices yet maintaining the focus on local Saudi culture norms. We certainly recommend Okeili &Co. to any family seeking to develop optimal and customized family governance framework to be a cornerstone for the family future success and continuity.” Sheikh Abdulmohsen Alissa, Chairman, Abdullatif Alissa Group Holding
“The combination of talented, supportive, dedicated and passionate team along with a high quality deliverable that make Okeili & Co. one of the cutting-edge advisory firms, which any large family enterprise can seek guidance from, in order to reach their goals and optimize their business for future success“ Mr. Saad Al Kroud, Steering Committee Head, Alissa Family
HOW DID OKEILI& CO HELP?
By virtue of Alissa family members’ effective partaking in our frequent workshops, Okeili designed its efforts around two main dimensions, the family institutions, and the family constitution. On the first dimension, Okeili & Co. has successfully designed and inaugurated the vital family governing bodies required to govern the family and the business.
On the second dimension, our team has drafted Alissa Constitution, a fifty-pager modus operandi, which explicitly shares policies, principles, and rules pertinent to the relationship of Alissa family members with the family, their business, and the wider community. The constitution ensured each and every Alissa family member receives predictable and fair treatment.
Throughout our intensive efforts, Okeili & Co. has adopted the “Tell me and I Forget, Teach me and I Remember, Involve me and I learn” approach (by Benjamin Franklin), thus involving most of Alissa family members to ensure the family emotional inheritance, the blend of values, stories, life lessons and Alissa traditions are passed down for two critical reasons. The first reason is to nurture the family unity and promote family spirit among the different generations. The second is to engage adequate knowledge transfer to a group of family members, which can down the line, grow into the championing committee that is responsible for making Alissa constitution a live document and further transforming it into a family embraced epic.
