Starting or creating a family office
How Can a New Office Establish a Professional Culture While Respecting Family Traditions?
Short answer. Set a small number of workplace standards with the family and explain how they reflect its values and traditions. Write down expectations for conduct, decisions, confidentiality, and accountability, then apply them consistently. Invite family input and name who has authority to manage the office and resolve disagreements.
A new family office can honor family traditions and set clear standards for staff. Identify the values and practices the family wants to preserve, then turn them into expectations employees can follow. From the start, clarify who directs the office, what conduct is expected, and how staff should communicate.
Agree on What the Office Exists to Do
Before writing policies, clarify the office's purpose, who it serves, and what work it will handle. Families may have different expectations for privacy, service, decision-making, and employee relationships. Discuss those differences openly and record decisions that affect daily operations. A family compass can help the family state its priorities and set out its objectives, mission, and values before building the office around them.
Traditions can guide how the office communicates, gathers family input, or marks important events. Employees should still know whose direction to follow. Define who supervises staff and approves work, and explain how competing requests are resolved. Governance arrangements can make these responsibilities explicit.
Turn Values Into Working Standards
Write practical policies covering conduct and confidentiality, as well as conflicts of interest, hiring, and performance. Explain what an employee should do if a family member gives an instruction outside the usual process, a potential conflict arises, or someone requests sensitive information. Apply the same standards to relatives employed by the office and outside staff.
Include family members in policy discussions when their decisions affect the office, and assign final responsibility to a named leader or governing body. The family can preserve personal customs and maintain consistent business procedures. This gives employees a stable framework and supports respectful working relationships.
Hire and Manage for the Culture
Describe the office's culture honestly during hiring. Candidates need to know the family's expectations, how much direct contact with family members the role involves, and how decisions are made. Assess candidates against professional requirements and their ability to work respectfully with the family. In my guidance on hiring, I recommend writing down selection criteria and the process, including how family members and friends will be considered.
When staff join, orient them to the family's history and values, along with its policies and communication preferences. Hold regular check-ins so employees can ask questions before confusion grows. Managers should base feedback on work standards and consider each person's performance. If traditions change a process, update the procedure and explain why.
Keep the Culture Consistent as the Office Grows
Review policies when the family's needs or the office's responsibilities change. Ask employees and family members where expectations are unclear, then revise the written guidance. Culture takes shape through repeated decisions. Leaders' responses to mistakes and disagreements, as well as requests for exceptions, help set expectations.
The family can preserve its identity while running a professional office. It can honor traditions, explain their reasons, and apply consistent standards to the work. Relatives and employees can then contribute with a shared understanding of how the office operates.
Everything else is constructed based on what the compass has told you.
Sources: How to Start a Family Office, The Single Family Office. Informational only, not financial, legal or tax advice.