The following blog post is a contribution from Ascent Private Capital Management, a Thought Leaders Council member of the Family Office Exchange.In today’s fast-paced world of technology, we seldom stop to reflect on the legacy of our grandparents and great-grandparents. And not just what they left us in their will. How often do we tell our children and grandchildren about the relatives who came before us: their names, where they lived, what they were like and what we learned from them? What about the family business: how did it start and has it always thrived and provided well...

Systems security and finding a software solution that integrates financial data across multiple functions rank as family offices’ top technology concerns, according to our latest study "2013 FOX Family Office Benchmarking: Technology in the Family Office." The respondents' sensitivity to security applies to both the data itself and communication of the data, with most participants (71%) opting to not send financial information to clients’ mobile devices. Family offices take a variety of approaches to safeguard their data with a majority (56%) expressing confidence in their security practi...

The following blog post is a contribution from Ascent Private Capital Management of U.S. Bank, a Thought Leaders Council member of the Family Office Exchange.The windfall of inherited wealth often comes with feelings of guilt and elation, isolation and confusion. Learning to be comfortable with inherited wealth is a process; a process of moving through emotional stages that can be aligned with the emotional stages of grief. There are six emotional stages of inheritance: disbelief, anger, euphoria, guilt, paralysis, and becoming “heirworthy.”1 The hope is that people will gradually make it...

There is a startling statistic in the recent FOX Benchmarking Report: Technology in the Family Office. Ninety-seven percent of family offices claim to have developed a disaster recovery plan. It is heartening to see that firms have adopted this best practice. It is only fitting, considering that family offices are providing critical wealth management and cash flow services that need to be dependable 24/7.Of course, these plans need to be continually revisited and updated as new threats appear and past assumptions are debunked. Hurricane Sandy proved the great humiliator to those wh...

The following blog post is a contribution from HUB International, a Thought Leaders Council member of the Family Office Exchange.I was recently visiting New York with my family. We had just returned from dinner and were relaxing in our hotel room when my daughter asked me to pass her cell phone to her. As I did, I noticed that she had been communicating during dinner with her siblings using something called Snapchat.Snapchat is a photo messaging application that enables users to send photos and videos, known as “snaps,” to a controlled list of recipients. It promises users a method to send ima...

On June 26, 2013, the Supreme Court of the United States issued two groundbreaking opinions regarding same-sex marriage. The rulings will substantially impact financial and estate planning for same-sex couples living in jurisdictions that recognize same-sex marriage. In the following interview, we talk to Susan Von Herrmann of FOX Thought Leaders Council Member Schiff Hardin about the rulings and what they mean for same-sex couples’ estate planning. The Supreme Court recently ruled on two cases regarding same-sex marriage: United States v. Windsor and Hollingsworth v. Perry. Can...

Businesses consistently cite the ability to attract and retain top talent as among the elements most critical to their success. This remains true today despite persistently high unemployment rates as many critical jobs go unfilled. But in many respects, hiring effectively is as much about bringing in the right cultural fit as it is about skill set. If you’re business’ growth is dependent on innovation, you’ll want to hire people comfortable with change and ambiguity. If you have a flat management structure, you’ll want to hire self-starters who don’t need a lot of direction to be success...

A majority (56%) of family offices have a governing board, according to the 2012 FOX Family Office benchmarking Board Report. Fifty-five percent of those with a governing board include external advisors, though outside advisors make up only 17% of all board members. Most family offices lack a strategic plan or risk management process, and less than half (44%) produce an annual report. Family office oversight and governance, however, show a marked increase in maturation and complexity once a family reaches the third generation. Infographic: Family Office Oversight and Governance

Millenials, or Gen Y, are a hot topic among wealth advisors these days and for good reason. As the industry ages, firms’ long-term success depends on being able to attract and retain the next generation of advisors. According to the Pew Research Center, the generation born between 1982 and 1993 numbers 77 million. That’s larger than the baby boomers and three times the size of Generation X. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, they will comprise 75 percent of the workforce by 2025 and will eclipse the boomers within the next few years. But they are not only wealth advisors’ future empl...

The job of advising the wealthy necessarily veers into the realms of the personal. Wealth advisors are as much family counselors as they are portfolio managers or financial planners. Issues like leadership succession or engaging the younger generations touch on such sensitive topics as aging, mortality, sibling rivalry, drug addiction, and divorce. That’s often where the true heavy lifting of being an advisor occurs, where the preservation of multigenerational wealth meets the lives of the family members. FOX President Alexandre Monnier recently led a panel discussion at our 2013 Wealth A...

Managing investments remains a primary reponsibility of family offices. According to our 2013 FOX Investment Survey, investment professionals comprise nearly a third of the average family office staff. Meanwhile, they draw on a number of different actors in the planning and decision making process with 67% utilizing an external consultant, 57% using a formal investment committee and 44% employing a chief invesment officer.Infographic: Investment Decision-Making and the Players by the Family Office Exchange

At every conference, there is a concept or word that stands out and becomes the catalyst of discussion at breaks and meals. Other speakers pick up on the term to demonstrate how their topic ties to this theme of interest.At the Family Office Exchange (FOX) Wealth Advisor Forum in Miami this year, the stand-out word was "courage." It was initially mentioned by Maria Elena Lagomasino, of WE Family Offices. She was discussing the advisor’s role in initiating the conversation about often sensitive subjects like transitioning family wealth to the next generation. These are difficult topics tha...

We are pleased to announce an improvement in the FOX Benchmarking Study for 2013.Since much of the data does not change from year to year, we are going to limit the study to those sections that do change annually and split it into smaller, single-topic modules that will be spaced throughout the year. Our intention is to make it easier for you to participate and coordinate data collection in your office. We have already concluded the first module, the 2013 Investment Survey. Soon we will be distributing instructions for a technology survey which will allow us to provide an updated view of ...

The following blog post is a contribution from AIG, a Thought Leaders Council member of the Family Office Exchange.It’s a common problem: A family receives a serious offer to sell their business for a very attractive price. They want to sell quickly, lock in their gains and use the proceeds for retirement and philanthropic pursuits. However, the buyer has asked to hold back as much as 20% of the purchase price for up to two years to protect against any unknown liabilities that may arise from the period when the family owned the business.So, how does the seller make a clean break and meet the b...

We are pleased to welcome Dan Schawbel as a keynote speaker at this year’s FOX Wealth Advisor Forum. Dan is the managing partner of Millennial Branding, a Gen Y research and consulting firm that specializes in personal and corporate branding. He is the author of the bestselling Me 2.0: 4 Steps to Building Your Future and the upcoming Promote Yourself: The New Art of Getting Ahead. He is also a frequent contributor to magazines such as TIME and Forbes. A prolific writer and speaker, Dan has spent much of his career discussing how the way we do business has changed and will continue to...

On Friday, April 19, we will be moving to the eighth floor within our current building into a more modern and cost-efficient office. Our office will officially close at noon that day to accomodate the movers. The servers will go offline in the afternoon, disrupting the following services until late Saturday or early Sunday:Listserv will be down. (No messages will be lost, but they will not be broadcast until after we’ve rebooted our servers.)The inter tech guide will be unavailable.Our fax lines will be down.We apologize in advance for any inconvenience this may cause.Our new Chicago mailing a...

Even the best leaders experience growing pains and stepping into a new leadership role within a family enterprise can be an especially challenging experience. In last week’s article, several industry experts shared leadership advice they’d offer the next generation. This week, we hear from three more contributors. Each has their own take on the subject, though if a single common theme emerged from their advice, it’s that leadership is often as much about listening as it is about providing direction. Here’s what this week’s contributors have to say:Penny Webb, founder of Famil...

We are pleased to welcome Howard Bragman as a keynote speaker at this year’s FOX Wealth Advisor Forum. Howard is the vice chairman of Reputation.com, an online reputation management organization, and founder of the public relations firm Fifteen Minutes. He is the author of Where's My Fifteen Minutes? Get Your Company, Your Cause, or Yourself the Recognition You Deserve, one of the seminal books on personal branding. He is also a consultant and frequent contributor to ABC News on issues related to reputation management.Howard’s keynote speech will address how to build and protect yo...

Recently, a conversation with a next gen member about leadership succession challenges within her family made me realize how frequently younger family members accept a leadership role only to find themselves overwhelmed by their new responsibilities. I recently asked several industry leaders what advice they’d give someone who is about to step into a family enterprise leadership position within the business, family council, board or foundation. This is what they had to say:Keith Whitaker, Ph.D., Co-founder of Wise Counsel Research Associates and co-author of The Cycle of the GiftI think that t...

It is the fate of almost every fourth-to-sixth generation family: the wealth dissipates as the family grows, unless their culture goes beyond wealth preservation to encourage wealth creation. That means taking informed risks (emphasis on informed). If some portion of the diversified asset pool is directed toward entrepreneurial endeavors, experience and insight are as important as investment dollars if you want to ensure the family’s money is well spent.Families who understand the value of informed risk-taking and entrepreneurial pursuits often invest in a formal training process that teaches ...

Wealthy families, single family offices, and wealth advisors continue to live in the long shadows of economic and political uncertainty, as well as generational transitions. If economic uncertainty has been a persistent concern since at least 2008, other macro trends are more dynamic in nature. Political uncertainty—from the fiscal cliff, to taxes, to compliance, and to regulations—characterized much of 2012 and is unlikely to dissipate in 2013. Economic concerns, too, are similarly dynamic in nature. This year, the eyes of wealthy investors remain closely trained on Europe.What are the implic...

Educating the next generation may very well be the key to multi-generational wealth sustainability. Education enables family members to be better, more confident decision makers. It allows them to have deeper, more effective discussions with family office executives and external advisors. In addition, when all family members have a strong foundation in wealth management and business fundamentals, they are in a better position to work together and discuss risks, opportunities and solutions. More importantly, it helps the next generation find their own career paths and develop a sense of indepen...

Amidst all the doom and gloom of European austerity and the general anxiety about the continent’s future, there is considerable evidence that Europe remains surprisingly well positioned to compete in the global market.For the past three decades, the World Economic Forum has performed a detailed annual assessment of the productive potential of nations. Its 2012/2013 report, covers 144 economies against more than 100 indicators, and serves as an antidote to the prevailing pessimism in Europe.Measured against “Twelve Pillars of Prosperity” (institutions, infrastructure, macroeconomic environment,...

Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action. -Peter DruckerIn the rush to wrap up 2012, taking time to stop and reflect on the office’s performance can feel like a luxury for which there is no time. Yet 44% of recent FOX Family Office Benchmarking™ participants tell us that they provide their governing board with an annual report of the value provided by the family office. Summarizing the varied and complex work accomplished by the average office staff on behalf of a multi-generational family enterprise is no small feat.How...

On November 29, 2012, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission issued a No-Action letter exempting family offices from registration as Commodity Pool Operators. Family Offices that qualify under SEC definition of a family office will be eligible.The new CFTC rule does require that family offices submit a claim for exemption stating that they are in compliance with the SEC regulation § 275.202(a)(11)(G)-1. The due date for submitting a claim is December 31, 2012.The CFTC had been considering requiring registration under the Commodities Exchange Act for family offices that trade futures contract...