Starting or creating a family office
How Should a New Office Document Its Procedures Before Staff Begin Work?
Short answer. Document recurring staff work with an owner, required inputs, approvals, steps, deadlines, and records to retain. Start with money movement, reporting, access to sensitive files, and investment review. Give staff usable checklists, explain how to handle exceptions, and update procedures when roles or family policies change.
A new office should document recurring staff work before people rely on memory or informal instructions. Each procedure needs an owner, clear steps, required approvals, timing, and a completion record.
Start With High-Impact Work
List the activities the office will handle from its first day. Common starting points include payment requests, wire transfers, investment review, account reporting, record storage, hiring, and communication with outside advisers. For each process, describe who starts it, what information they need, who reviews or approves the work, how it is completed, and where records are kept.
Keep procedures practical. Staff should be able to follow the written steps without relying on one person's private knowledge. Use a short checklist for repeat tasks and include links to required forms or systems. The operational processes guide can help identify workflows to map.
Connect Procedures to Governance
Procedures should reflect family decisions about authority, privacy, and responsibilities. A payment checklist, for example, should show the approval limit and required signers. An investment process should identify who reviews due diligence and who can approve a commitment. Rules for sensitive records should state who has access and how access changes are handled.
Set a process for exceptions, too. If a request lacks documentation or an approver is unavailable, staff need to know whom to contact and what to record. An exception should not silently create a new rule. The single family office governance guide provides a starting point for documenting decision rights and responsibilities, along with relevant policies.
Make Procedures Usable and Current
Give staff the procedures before they take responsibility for a process, then walk through the steps together. Make sure each person understands where records are stored and how to escalate an unusual request. Name a procedure owner to keep the instructions current. Review them when duties change, an office policy is revised, or a process repeatedly breaks down.
In my experience, writing down how work is done makes training easier and helps spot gaps. Start with processes that move money or expose sensitive information, then add other recurring work as the office takes it on. For help defining the office's scope and responsibilities, see fundamentals of creating a single family office and partners, vendors and service providers. Talk with your attorney or CPA when procedures touch legal or tax obligations.
Drawing or writing out how a process works forces you to understand it at a deeper level, and it makes for easier transfer of knowledge between those on your team with different levels of experience or years of history within the family office.
Sources: The Family Office Book. Informational only, not financial, legal or tax advice.