Two Books. Two Problems. One Career's Worth of Answers.
Two Books. Two Problems. One Career's Worth of Answers.
I never planned to write two books. I planned to write zero.
For nearly twenty years I worked inside the aerospace industry — starting as a CNC operator on the shop floor and finishing as Managing Director of operations spanning six countries. Along the way I watched brilliant founders build companies that ran like machines, and then watched those same founders nearly destroy everything when it came time to step away. I watched leaders who could manage a supply chain across three continents but could not hold a difficult conversation with their own children about who would take over the family business. I watched veteran employees who carried decades of institutional knowledge in their heads walk out the door with no plan for transferring any of it.
These were not failures of intelligence. They were failures of preparation. And the advisory industry — the one that was supposed to help — was making it worse. Advisors who showed up with frameworks and PowerPoint decks and then left before the hard work started. Consultants who had never set foot on a production floor telling manufacturing owners how to run a succession. Nobody was staying through the implementation, because staying is harder than advising.
That is why I wrote these books.
Don't Exit Wrong
Don't Exit Wrong is the book I wish every founder of a family-owned manufacturing business would read five years before they plan to step away. Not five months. Not after the first health scare. Five years.
Succession is not a transaction. It is not a legal event that happens on signing day. It is a process that touches every part of the business — from the veteran employees who have been running the floor since before your children were born, to the customer relationships that exist because of your personal handshake, to the financial structures that need to survive the transition intact.
I wrote this book because I have been inside these businesses. I have sat across the table from the founder who could not admit that his son was not ready. I have worked with the daughter who was more than ready but had never been given the authority to prove it. I have managed the veteran employee who had already decided to leave the moment the founder announced his retirement, taking thirty years of knowledge with him.
Don't Exit Wrong covers the full arc of succession — from the first honest conversation about whether you are ready to let go, through the operational independence testing that proves your business can run without you in the building, to the financial structures that protect the value you have spent a lifetime creating. Every chapter is grounded in real situations I have experienced firsthand, not theoretical models borrowed from a textbook.
The book is structured around the same domains I use in my Legacy Succession System — the advisory engagement I run with founders who want hands-on guidance through the process. But the book stands on its own. You do not need to work with me to benefit from what is in these pages. You need to be honest with yourself about where your business stands, and you need to start the work before it becomes urgent.
If you are a founder of a family-owned manufacturing business with 50 to 200 employees, and you have not yet started planning your succession, this book is your starting point. If you have started but the process has stalled — because of family dynamics, because of resistant employees, because you quietly believe nobody can do it as well as you — this book will show you what is actually going on and what to do about it.
Leading with Character Across Cultures — Edition 2
Leading with Character Across Cultures was published in late 2025 and became an Amazon Best Seller within weeks of launch. That response told me two things: the content resonated, and there was more to say.
Edition 2 is not a reprint with a new cover. It is a substantially updated version of the book — new frameworks, deeper case studies, and the lessons I kept learning after the first edition went to print. The core argument remains the same: leadership is not a set of techniques you apply differently depending on which country you are in. It is a set of character traits that translate everywhere, if you are willing to do the work of understanding how they are expressed and received in different cultural contexts.
This book draws from my own experience leading teams across Sweden, the United States, Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, and Thailand. It is not an academic study of cultural dimensions. It is a practitioner's account of what actually happens when you step off the plane and discover that the leadership approach that worked in Trollhättan does not work in Bangalore — and what you do about it without losing yourself in the process.
Edition 2 expands the Integrated Leadership System I introduced in the first edition — nine capabilities that hold up across cultural boundaries. I will give you two examples. Self-awareness: not the motivational poster version, but the hard realization that your leadership defaults are cultural products, not universal truths. And change leadership: the ability to walk into a factory where nobody asked for your opinion and build enough trust to move people in a new direction without destroying what already works. The other seven are explored the same way — through real situations, not hypothetical frameworks. It is the same system I use in my Character-Driven Leadership Module, the program I run for leaders who want to go deeper than what a book can offer. But the book stands on its own.
If you lead people across borders, across cultures, or across generations within a family business, this book is for you. It is the book I wish someone had handed me the first time I walked into a factory floor in a country where I did not speak the language and had to earn trust before I could earn results.
Where to Get Them
I built these companion resources because I know how books work — you read them, you agree with the ideas, and then nothing changes. These tools make sure something does. Both books are available now as ebook and paperback on Amazon and right here on bjornvikard.com.
If you purchase through this website, you receive exclusive companion resources with each book — practical diagnostic tools, assessment frameworks, and planning checklists that complement the content. These resources are not available through Amazon. The book prices are identical on both platforms; the companion resources are the reason to buy direct.
Don't Exit Wrongincludes the Founder Independence Scorecard, the Succession Red Flags Checklist, and the Eye-Opener Action Map — tools that help you assess where you stand and what to do about it.
Leading with Character Across Cultures, Edition 2includes the Cultural Leadership Self-Check and the 5-Question Conflict Decoder — tools that help you measure your cross-cultural effectiveness and handle disagreements across cultural boundaries.
The Anti-Consultant Approach
I call myself The Anti-Consultant because I believe advisors should stay until the work is done, not until the budget runs out. These books are written in the same spirit. I am not selling you a framework and leaving you to figure out the implementation. I am telling you what I have seen, what I have done, and what works — in plain language, from real experience, with nothing held back.
If you read either book and want to go deeper — whether that means the Legacy Succession System for founders facing succession, or the Character-Driven Leadership Module for leaders navigating cross-cultural challenges — I am here for that conversation. But the books come first. Read them. Decide for yourself whether the approach makes sense for your situation. That is how trust gets built.
I spent two decades earning the right to write these books. I hope they save you some of the mistakes I watched other people make.
Björn Vikard
Founder, Vikard Coaching
Bangkok, Thailand
