# Family Business / Management — steal this assignment
_EL3vate 2026 · Day 8 · Part 14 of 15 · build f31f6d0_

## Try it Tuesday (90 minutes)
90 minutes, one case. Minutes 0–15: sketch a succession or governance scenario and give each party a one-line statement of what they believe was promised. Minutes 15–70: students take turns facilitating the AI family-council prompt, which plays three parties with conflicting assumptions; they must keep the conversation productive without solving it for the family. Minutes 70–90: the room names the moment each facilitator's meeting went sideways and what a better move would have been. The deliverable is a short facilitation self-critique; it grades facilitation, not the outcome.

## The assignment
**Make it (Laser cut · engrave).** A physical governance or succession decision board: roles, claims and constraints as pieces that have to be placed somewhere. Putting the pieces on the table forces the conversation the family has been avoiding.

**Build it (AI chat · no code).** A family council simulation with three generations at the table, each with different assumptions about what was promised. Students facilitate rather than solve, which is the actual job.

## 4-week plan
- **Wk 1.** Case selection and stake mapping. Every party gets a written statement of what they believe they were promised — the roles, claims and constraints the decision board will render as movable pieces.
- **Wk 2.** Cut the decision board from the stake map and submit the file at the start of the week. Run the AI family council; students facilitate. Transcript plus a written account of the moment it went sideways.
- **Wk 3.** While the board is cut, students rehearse facilitation and refine each party’s promise statement.
- **Wk 4.** Live facilitation with the board, peers playing the family. Assessment is on the facilitation, not the outcome.

## What this replaces
- **Replaces:** The written succession-plan case analysis.
- **What is lost:** The comprehensive written governance recommendation.
- **What is gained:** Students rehearse the actual hard part — facilitating a conversation nobody wants to have, among parties who each remember a different promise — instead of writing a tidy recommendation no family would sit through; the grade rewards process over solution.

## Where AI is bad at this
A model asked to run a multi-party family dispute resolves it — driving the parties to consensus, softening the conflict, and offering the facilitator a clean recommendation, because it is trained to be helpful and agreeable. That cooperative drift removes exactly the friction the exercise needs, and it will also produce confident 'best-practice' governance advice that ignores the specific relational history driving the impasse.

## Rubric
| Criterion | Weight | What it assesses |
|---|---|---|
| Facilitation stance | 30% | The student facilitates rather than solves, holding space for the parties instead of imposing an answer. |
| Surfacing the conflicting promises | 25% | Draws out what each party believes was promised and makes the mismatch discussable. |
| Managing the rupture | 25% | Recognizes when the meeting goes sideways and adjusts, rather than pushing through. |
| Restraint from premature resolution | 20% | Resists both the AI's and the student's pull toward a tidy consensus the family has not reached. |

## Starter prompt
> Run a family business succession meeting simulation. Play three people at once, clearly labeled: the founder who has not actually decided to leave, the child who has been running operations for a decade, and the sibling who left the business but still owns shares. Each of them believes something different about what was promised. I am the facilitator, not a family member. Do not resolve the conflict for me. Let the meeting go badly if I facilitate badly.

## Budget & logistics
- **Instructor prep:** 1.5 hours
- **Class time:** 90 minutes
- **Per-student cost:** $0 for the Tuesday version; roughly $8–15 per team in laser stock **[unverified]** for an engraved succession or governance decision board in the four-week build.
- **Fabrication file due:** First day of Week 2 — cut the decision board from the week-1 stake map (roles, claims, constraints as pieces). PACE quotes 7–10 business days (up to 14 calendar days), so it clears before the week-4 live facilitation.
- **Calendar dependency:** Facilitation reps need no lead time. The decision board is roles, claims and constraints drawn from the week-1 stake map, so its cut file goes in at the start of week 2 and the up-to-14-calendar-day turnaround clears before the week-4 facilitation.

## Three sizes
- **One session:** The 90-minute rotating-facilitation session producing a facilitation self-critique; no fabrication.
- **4 weeks:** The seeded four-week plan: stake mapping with written promise-statements, facilitated AI councils, a fabricated decision board, then live facilitation with peers playing the family.
- **One semester:** A full case — stake mapping with written promise-statements, repeated facilitated AI councils, a fabricated decision board, and a live facilitation assessed on process across a real governance question.

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_PACE · Shidler College of Business · University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa · pace.shidler.hawaii.edu/maker_
_All fifteen assignments, the demos and every handout: https://el3vate.vercel.app_