Lifetime to Legacy: A New Vision for Multigenerational Family Businesses

This is not a succession manual. It is an argument that a family business is not an asset the founder owns, but a trust the family holds; and that continuity belongs to families who learn the difference. Drawing on almost two decades inside family enterprise as a second-generation owner in Africa and an advisor to multigenerational families across three continents, Nike Anani reframes the founder's task: not holding on, but handing over. Not protecting the enterprise of the past, but entrusting the enterprise of the future.
 
The journey from lifetime to legacy is that conversion; a lifetime of achievement, ownership, and control transformed into something held for generations not yet born. With clarity and candor, Nike walks through what stewardship actually requires of a family: the founder's role and its release, the rising generation's inheritance of responsibility rather than mere assets, the dynamics that quietly decide whether a family connects or fractures, and the shared vision that turns diverse generations into co-creators rather than competitors.
Lifetime to Legacy is for:

• Founders and business owners wrestling with what letting go really means;
• Rising-generation members preparing to carry what they did not build;
• Advisors who serve enterprising families and need language for the conversation that precedes every structure.

If you believe a family business is something you own, this book will challenge you. If you suspect it is something you hold, it will equip you.

Nike Anani is a cross-border family wealth advisor with almost two decades of experience spanning Africa, Europe, and the United States. Her work focuses on the intersection of family governance, succession planning, and the unique dynamics facing multigenerational families navigating wealth across jurisdictions and cultures. It rests on a single conviction: that a family enterprise is a trust to be stewarded, not a possession to be owned and that continuity belongs to families who learn the difference.

She previously served as Global Director of Next Generation Advisory at Northern Trust Corporation, where she co-hosted the Secrets of Enterprising Families podcast. She is the author of Lifetime to Legacy: A New Vision for Multigenerational Family Businesses and a contributing author to the American Bar Association's Guide to International Estate Planning: Design, Administration, and Compliance (3rd Edition, 2026). She contributed to the three-part series "Letting Go of the Dead Hand" in Trusts & Estates magazine, which examines the limitations of traditional trust planning, challenges the widespread practice of silent trusts, and advocates for transparency, communication, and beneficiary empowerment in trust relationships.

Nike holds a BSc in Economics (First Class Honours) from University College London and is based in Austin, Texas.