ALLISON KAPLAN
Special to The Jewish News

S

ometimes attorney Chad
Zamler gets messages in the
middle of a deposition.
Important messages from a.
senior partner who occupies the office
next door. Messages such as, "Your --
mother wants to know if you'll join us
for dinner tonight."
"His mother does give me a lot of
messages to give him," said Gene
Zamler, that senior partner who also
happens to be 27-year-old Chad's dad.
"But it's not a problem."
Yet, aside from Mom's inevitable
intrusions, Gene and Chad say their
relationship at work is strictly busi-
ness.
"We've been very successful at sepa-
rating the personal from the profes-
sional," said Chad, who two years ago
joined his father's Southfield-based
personal injury law firm, Zamler,
Mellen & Shiffman. He was prepared
to work extra hard, just to convince
the other lawyers he wasn't getting
special treatment. Much to his sur-
prise, Chad said sharing the last name
of a senior partner has only height-
ened his credibility among co-workers.
"I get a lot more respect than I ever
anticipated because of my father's high
level of integrity," Chad said.
He's one of many Detroit area
twenty- and thirtysomethings discov-
ering that working with a parent,
while not necessarily a free trip, can be
an enriching, and educational, experi-
ence.
"I've learned so much more about
my father," said 29-year-old Dr.
Daniel Phillips of Huntington Woods,
who joined his father's solo optometry
practice in Southgate last year. "Grow-
ing up, I knew my dad only after 6
p.m. I didn't know what a terrific man

Allison Kaplan is a freelance writer
based in Chicago.

Sov. 6
dinner for
V riday,
and
Sliabbat
services
Youn g adults and. young couples.
Scholar-in-residence Professor
Barbara Spectre will talk about ,
"Lady Luck and "ate." 6 p.m.
haarey Zedek.
Congregation S 248
Information-. () 357-5544.

-

11/6
1998

76 Detroit Jewish News

All In The
Family

firm, said he remembers having fewer
choices when he began his career.
"I started with my father as an
employee and worked my way up," he
said. "It was very different. I didn't go
anywhere else to learn, which I think
is easier on both parries."
Jimmy Hooberman, 32, had no
interest in joining the family steel
business. Real estate development was
his dream, so he got a master's degree
and worked in New York for a while.
"When I decided to come home
and start a business, my dad said,
`Why not do something together?"
Jimmy recalled. "I thought long and
hard about it. If I have an argument
with my father at work, and then we
go home to have dinner that night ... I
didn't want to ruin a very nice rela-
tionship."
So the Hoobermans set ground
rules, which they say have made work-
ing together a delight.
"We're both treated as partners, and
we have respect for what each of us
brings to the table," said Jimmy, a
West Bloomfield resident. "We try to

Young adults
who work with their
parents try hard to please,
and they reap the rewards
of diligence.

he was, how he treats patients. Now,
we're able to talk on so many different
levels."
Perhaps more levels, Dan confesses,
than his wife might like.
"Occasionally, my dad and I will
get into a discussion about work at
home, but we try to leave it at the
office," he said. The pair work togeth-
er six days a week, and even carpool
back and forth. "In the car, it's back to
being father and son," Dan said.
Like in any job, Dan said working
with his dad, Will, is not always
bliss. But it is comforting. Dan
made the decision to follow in
his dad's footsteps after
exploring other options and

realizing that being an eye doctor was
keep the fact that we're father and son
something he could be happy doing
out of it. But," he pauses, "I still call
for the rest of his life.
him Dad at work."
"My kids certainly had exposure to
Family business attorney Ralph
my career," said Will Phillips, "but I
Castelli Jr. of Kemp, Klein, Umphrey
never hawked it. I didn't
& Endelman in Troy, said
want to influence them."
the important thing when
Top: Drs. Daniel and
Yet, years ago, that was-
working with family is
Will Phillz *ps with an
n't always the case. Many
making sure everyone
inflatable eye.
members of the Baby
understands the expecta-
Boomer generation grew
tions.
Above: Maxine Wein-
up under the assumption
"Kids need to be
berg and her daughter
that their children would
judged on their business
Jodi at Travel-Max.
follow into a family busi-
performance, not blood-
ness.
lines," said Castelli, who founded a
Paul Hooberman, owner of SP Fab
Detroit chapter of the Family Firm
Co. in Madison Heights and now co-
Institute,- a group of professionals who
owner of his son Jimmy's real estate
offer guidance to relatives working