This 2011 FOX Fall Forum session explored the link between family engagement and emotional stewardship. It also examined the role of education and communication in enhancing emotional ownership.
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Families that successfully manage generational planning actively foster communication and trust within the family, identify shared values that define the family, take time to establish a thoughtful family governance system and give younger members the opportunity to have an impact through active participation in family affairs.
In a series of articles, the author has written about problems of trust and distrust in family enterprises. In the third in the series, he discusses a fictionalized case of an owner who resists forming, or even learning about, professional family offices. The article analyzes ways advisors can persist (without being fired) in raising the issues a founder needs to address for the family's long-term health.
Suggestions for how to preserve a family legacy across generations include not letting shared assets become liabilities, recognizing that family businesses are businesses, communicating in the way that works best for family members, acknowledging family dynamics and choosing trustees carefully.
A growing number of families use social networking sites to stay connected and share personal and business information. For ultra-wealthy families, however, the risks involved with public websites can be significant. In this 2010 FOX Financial Executives Forum session, Mr. Thijssen reviews how advancements in technology make the creation of a family website easier and provide greater security and confidentiality for data sharing.
A paper from The Madison Group says the ability of family members to meet, discuss and make decisions about issues is a critical component of long-term harmony in the family. Discussion begins with the individual members learning the skills to "show up" in a positive way and is carried through in a process that can be trusted and honored.
In addition to having an external mission, many family foundations create an internal one specifying how the foundation will function in family-building, education and the transfer of family values from one generation to the next. Foundation Source offers concrete examples of how some families are using their foundations to make a difference within the family as well as in the external world.
At its best, family philanthropy provides families with an opportunity to reinvigorate their grantmaking, inviting the contribution of fresh and original ideas and approaches from younger generations, and bringing families together in pursuit of a mission inspired by common values. Research conducted for Credit Suisse shows the diversity of experience of family philanthropists around the globe.
Family business consultant Kenneth Kaye discusses some characteristics that facilitate trust among family members in two types of enterprises – family offices and family-owned businesses – as well as a conflict resolution intervention that capitalizes on humans' instinctive propensity to trust.
Families need to learn how to talk about money openly and participate in saving, spending and giving together. The result, Silver Bridge Advisors says, will be an increase in the number of financially thoughtful children in the world, a greater ability for the next generation to use their wealth responsibly, and an increased likelihood that family values will endure for generations.