Family Wealth: Keeping It in the Family--How Family Members and Their Advisers Preserve Human, Intellectual, and Financial Assets for Generations (Bloomberg Book 34)

I believe that many families could strengthen their family governance practices by implementing a trustee reaffirmation system.

the family balance sheet measures human and intellectual capital as well as financial capital. The family balance sheet is an attempt to measure how well a family is managing its human capital. A family balance sheet is an addition to, not a substitute for, a family financial statement. A family wealth management business, like every other financia

They have understood that the critical first step for a family beginning long-term wealth preservation is to found an excellent system for decision making, a system of governance. The second step is adoption of a formal process for each successive generation to reaffirm its acceptance of the family’s system of governance.

FAMILIES WHO RECOGNIZE with ritual the important passages in their members’ lives seem to fare better at overcoming the shirtsleeves proverb. This should not be surprising, since the creation and practice of rituals marking important developmental steps in the life of a human being are at the core of successful tribal life.

Families attempting long-term wealth preservation often don’t understand that they are businesses and that the techniques of long-term succession planning practiced by all other businesses are available to them as well. A family that starts its long-term wealth preservation planning by adopting the metaphor that it is a business will begin with a w

The assets of a family are its individual members. (D) The wealth of a family consists of the human and intellectual capital of its members. A family’s financial capital is a tool to support the growth of the family’s human and intellectual capital. (E) To successfully preserve its wealth, a family must form a social compact among its members refle

Long-Term Wealth Preservation as a Question of Family Governance

In my family’s governance system, we have a family assembly consisting of my parents, my siblings, their spouses and significant others, and the eleven grandchildren and their spouses. We assemble annually to do the work of the legislative branch. On the infrequent occasions when a dispute arises among family members, these matters naturally flow u

The mission of family governance must be the enhancement of the pursuit of happiness of each individual member.