At its core, a mission statement serves as a compass, continually steering an organization or business toward their goals. For the families who undertake the process of creating a mission statement, it provides a similar and essential navigational tool. To be successful, however, the mission statement must resonate and mean something to everyone in the family. It should ideally look inward to identify each family member’s personal values.
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This research brief uses direct feedback from members of the rising gen to identify their top concerns and shed new insights into the important goals they have with their family. With the data and recommendations gathered, you can learn more about the group—including the challenges and pressures they face—to create a roadmap that leads to productive family engagement and communications, action planning, and problem-solving.
When setting up a family legacy plan that extends across generations, it’s vital to have a family governance plan that empowers a family to govern its wealth and enterprises as a cohesive unit. While each family is unique, the keys to incorporating an effective family governance will be uniting around shared purposes, having a written family constitution that sets forth broad principles and policies in areas that are identified by the family as needed, and keeping it separate from any operating business governance.
In 2022 Dr. Jamie Weiner published The Quest for Legitimacy: How Children of Prominent Families Find Their Place in the World, a collection of qualitative research modeling rites of passage, pathways to individuation, creating trusted partnerships, and addressing family dynamics. Similarly, in 2022 FOX has conducted focus groups and a rising gen study, which affirms what we know about rising gen, and illuminates the methods to ensuring success and fulfillment.
The current next-generation family members are changing the way families view wealth, no longer focusing on creating wealth for wealth’s sake.
From a global crisis triggering a family’s restructuring, to an entrepreneur-turned-global-investor’s commitment to change the world, six case studies demonstrate how some international champion enterprise families are assessing their threats and opportunities, reinventing themselves, and delivering the full potential of family capital to realize their desired vision and positively impact the world.
Some trends move slowly until they reach a point of inflection, at which time they seem to accelerate at almost blinding speed. So it has been for the rapid emergence of The New Era of Family Wealth. The departure from the past has been driven by four trends (transitions, talent, technology, and time) introduced by FOX in January of 2022. As these four trends have continued to persist, they have now become the transformative force behind this New Era.
The past year challenged families to react to adverse trends to protect their enterprise and build capabilities to achieve their vision. The journey from uncertainty to impact requires an elevated enterprise mindset and determination to persevere throughout the four-stage evolution to position the family enterprise for long-term success and positive community impact.
FOX Foresight keeps you up to date on our latest thinking about matters affecting families, family offices, and their advisors. It gives you our forward look on what we're learning from our members and subject matter experts. Please share it broadly with your family, your office, and your advisors. 2023 FOX Foresight is presented in 8 chapters:
Historically, beneficiaries learned of wealth transfer plans only after the death of the grantor. However, this approach often leads to unanswered questions and, potentially, feelings of betrayal when expectations for future gifts are left unmet. There are several planning tools, including a Statement of Wealth Transfer (SOWTI), that can facilitate a more harmonious and purposeful transfer of both wealth and family values. From this workbook with sample approaches and thoughtful questions on defining wealth and the role of trusts, learn how to develop your own SOWTI.