According to the Harvard Business Review, some 70 percent of family-owned businesses fail after the second generation takes over. So what does it take for a second generational business to survive? “Key values,” says Rob McPhee, president of McPhee Associates, Inc. 

2022 marks 50 years of business for McPhee Associates of Cape Cod. “My father, Bob McPhee, started the business in 1970 and officially incorporated McPhee Associates in 1972,” says McPhee. “He built this business from the ground up, into what it has become today.” Fast forward from its humble roots of new construction work, the company has expanded to architectural design work, renovations, additions, teardowns, and property management services. 

Today, McPhee is the proud president of the company his father began all those years ago. “I was exposed to the business from a very young age,” notes McPhee. “I was going out in the dump trucks with the guys on the crew, going to the lumber yards to pick up stock, digging holes, pouring concrete, cleaning up job sites–all before I even had my driver’s license.” During those years, McPhee learned the value of being part of a team. “Over the summers in college I would work in the field on the Cape, driving the truck around, doing all sorts of fieldwork, seeing it from the field operations side,” he explains. After graduating from college and spending some time away from the Cape, McPhee made his move back home in 2000 to start at his family’s business full time. Together, the father-son duo has created a family business that is known all over Cape Cod.  ...