Family Businesses: Building Legacies That Last: An exchange from families to families

Wednesday, November 11, 2026

2:00 p.m Visits to Local Leading Family-Owned Businesses

Local families have agreed to open their doors to workshop participants. Small groups will visit one of several leading family-owned businesses in Barcelona, accompanied by a family member as host. This year’s visits include family enterprises with significant sourcing, investment, or operational presence in Africa.  Shuttles depart from the recommended hotels between 1:30 p.m. and 2:00 p.m., returning by 5:30 p.m. Shuttles to the dinner venue depart at 7:00 p.m.

06:00 p.m Return to hotels

7:30 p.m Welcome with Drinks and Dinner  

The second edition opens with an evening of welcome drinks and dinner.

Keynote: “Africa’s Entrepreneurs and the Continent’s Next Chapter”

(To be confirmed)

A personal and forward-looking address by a prominent African leader,drawing on his/her own experience building and investing across the continent.  The speaker will set the tone for the three days.

10:15 p.m Closing and Transfer to Hotels

Thursday, November 12, 2026

08:30 – 09:00  Arrival and Registration- IESE Business School North Campus

09:00 – 09:05 Welcome & Introduction

• Heinrich Liechtenstein, Professor of Financial Management, IESE Business School

A brief welcome to all participants.

09:10– 09:20  Opening Remarks

• Afonso Libano Daurella, Chairman of FBN Internacional

09:20 – 10:30 Introduction of Families and Participants 

• Heinrich Liechtenstein, Professor of Financial Management, IESE Business School

Each family introduces themselves. Returning families share one thing that has shifted since 2025. New families share who they are and what has brought them here. Participants are asked to prepare in advance — thinking beyond a brief biography to what defines their family’s approach to business and community.

10:30 – 11:00 Connection Time

11:00 – 12:15 Family Ownership and Its Responsibilities: Inside the Business and Beyond

• Jeroen Neckebrouck, Associate Professor in the Entrepreneurship Department, IESE Business School
• Dr. Ansah Twumwaa, IESE Business School

Family ownership shapes a business from the inside out. This session examines two dimensions of that: how governance affects the people who work in the firm — their skills, their development, their reasons for staying or leaving — and how it shapes the way the family engages with the communities around it. Professor Neckebrouck presents research on human capital development in African family businesses. Dr. Ansah follows with initial findings on African family philanthropy. Taken together, they address a single question: what does family ownership actually mean for the people a business touches — inside and out?.

11:45 – 12:15 Keynote: Africa’s Family Businesses as a Development Force

(To be confirmed)

A 30 minute address from one of the world’s most prominent voices on African economic development. Whether the lens is private capital, development finance, or the long-term story of family-owned enterprise, this address makes the case for why the families in this room are among the most consequential actors on the continent — and what is at stake in the next decade. [Title to be confirmed with speaker.]

12:15 – 13:15  Panel: Africa as a Business Opportunity – The View from Families Who Know Both Worlds

Moderated by Professor Heinrich Liechtenstein, IESE Business School

(Panelists to be confirmed)

A conversation between four family business leaders who operate across geographies and understand what it takes to build lasting enterprises in and with Africa. The discussion explores how global families approach investment and partnership on the continent, what they consistently misread, and what the most durable cross-border family relationships are actually built on.

13:15 – 15:00  Lunch, Restaurant North Campus

15:00 – 16:00 Rich Peer-to Peer Introduction in 8 Breakout Groups

Groups are invited to use a guiding question as their starting point: ‘Beyond the business, what is your family most proud of having contributed to the world around you — and what do you hope to contribute next?’ Groups are composed to balance families across geographies and sectors.

16:00 – 16:15 Break 

16:15 – 17:15  Breakout I 

Governance, People and Giving: How Family Businesses Shape the World Around Them.

The morning raised two questions that are more connected than they first appear: how does the way we govern our business affect the people who work for us, and how does it shape the way we give? Both come down to the same choice — what kind of institution do we want our family business to be? This session invites participants to explore that question from their own experience.

17:15 – 17:30 Break

17:30 – 18:30 Breakout II 

Turning Shared Values Into Cross-Border Partnerships.

Taking the conversations from Breakout I as its starting point, this session asks: where does genuine alignment exist between the families at your table, and what could it support? Groups work through the practical questions of what a first step toward collaboration looks like — commercial, philanthropic, or both — and leave with at least one named relationship worth developing further.

18:30 End of first day of academical program and transfer to hotels

20:00 Transfer from hotel to dinner venue

20:30 Dinner hosted by Alfonso Libano Daurella, Chairman of FBN International. 

Friday, November 13, 2026

08:30 Wake-up Coffee at IESE Business School, North Campus

09:00 – 09:30 FBN Africa: State of the Network

• Alexis du Roy de Blicquy, FBN

This session takes stock of where FBN Africa stands: which chapters are formally established, which are in development, and what the path forward looks like in Kenya, Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Ethiopia, and South Africa. Representatives from active chapters are invited to share what has brought their families to this point and what they hope the chapter will offer their peers at home. An honest conversation about what has been built and what comes next

09:30 – 10:30 Panel: What FBN Africa Means to Us.

Moderated by Alexis du Roy de Blicquy, FBN

(Participating Panelists to be confirmed)

Families who have engaged most deeply with FBN share what they have taken from the experience and what they hope the network will become. Personal in tone but rather an honest account of what peer learning between family businesses actually feels like from the inside.

10:30 – 11:00 Break Connection Time

11:00 – 12:00 Keynote: The Power of Family Ownership – Reimagining What a Business Owes the World

• Valeria Mars (Mars Family Enterprises) – (Invitation extended)

Mars is one of the largest family businesses on earth and a significant actor in the agricultural supply chains that run through Africa — cocoa, coffee, and food systems that touch millions of smallholder farmers across the continent. Valeria Mars speaks from direct experience about how the Mars family has used its ownership position to pursue something beyond profit: rebuilding the natural systems its supply chains depend on, and rethinking what long-term family ownership means for the communities and ecosystems it operates within. A practitioner’s account of what it takes to move a large family enterprise toward a regenerative model, and what it means for the families and communities at the other end of the supply chain.

12:00 – 12:45 Panel: What Legacy Looks Like Across Generations

Featuring a conversation between 2 families, African and Global, represented by members of 2 generations. Participating families to be confirmed
Two family businesses from either side of the mediterranean share the stage alongside their own next generation. What does running their respective businesses across generations actually mean? What do the children see differently from their parents? This is a conversation about legacy, change, and what a family business is at its core — made more honest by having two generations speaking together.

12:45 – 14:30 Lunch at IESE North Campus Restaurant

14:30 – 15:30 Breakout III 

One Network, Many Doors: How FBN Chapters Can Work Together Across Continents

Led by FBN International

Led by FBN, this session explores what inter-chapter collaboration looks like in practice: what established chapters have built with each other, what the African chapters need most in their early years, and how non-African families and chapters can play a meaningful role. Groups leave with at least one specific commitment to follow up on with an African chapter.

15:30 – 15:45 Break

15:45 – 16:00

Introduction to From Inputs to Insights to Intentions

• Marc Sosna, IESE Business School

16:00 – 17:00 Breakout IV

From Inputs to Insights to Intentions.

Participants return to their breakout groups for a structured reflection on the three days. Each participant identifies the insights most relevant to them and considers what they intend to do differently as a result. Groups close with one shared observation to bring back to the full plenary.

17:00 – 17:15 Break 

17:15 – 17:45 Reflection on Insights, Intentions and Potential Actions

• Professor Heinrich Liechtenstein, Professor of Financial Management, IESE Business School

The full group comes together for a final plenary. Participants share the insights they are taking home and the actions they are considering. Hearing what others have taken from the same three days is often as useful as the sessions themselves.

17:45– 18:00  Next Steps for FBN Africa

• Alexis du Roy de Blicquy, FBN

A closing address looking at where FBN Africa goes from here: what the chapters will offer their members, how families can stay engaged between annual workshops, and what the 2027 edition might address.

18:00 End of the FBN – IESE Africa Workshop 2026

20:00 Closing Evening (Format TBD)