Field note
Documenting roles before you promote a family member
20 February 2026 · James Okonkwo
Promoting a son, daughter, or cousin into a senior role without a written role profile is one of the most common triggers for our Team & Role Mapping work. Everyone agrees the person is capable. Nobody agrees what they are now responsible for — including the person being promoted.
The gap between title and work
“Operations Manager” at a family firm might mean running the warehouse, handling HR complaints, approving leave, negotiating with the landlord, and attending industry association dinners. The title sounds clear. The week-to-week reality is a bundle of tasks that lived in the founder’s head.
What a role profile should contain
We draft profiles with four sections:
- Purpose — one sentence on why the role exists
- Key responsibilities — five to eight bullet points, verb-led
- Decision rights — what they can approve without escalation, and what still requires owner sign-off
- Interfaces — who they hand work to and receive work from
The outgoing leader reviews and edits. The incoming leader confirms what they are willing to own. Disagreements surface early, in a document, rather than six months into the role.
A common mistake
Writing the profile for the person you hope they become, not the person starting on Monday. A first-year operations manager profile should reflect a learning curve and defined check-ins, not the full scope the founder carried after thirty years.