Family Office Elite Spring_16

family office model but the three generation linear
time focus of our recommendations. Legacy planning
requires, at least, a seven generation focus. This longterm
multi-generational approach has been difficult to
implement in the past since personal technology was
limited to gadgets versus data. As the third industrial
revolution created a digital world, family offices now
are capable of capturing, preserving, empowering, and
passing on the family story like no other time in history.
Nevertheless, even though wealth has grown
exponentially among new entrepreneurs and innovators,
I still encounter family offices, and their families,
focusing only on the money management needs of
the immediate nuclear family. I can only assume that
it is the rapid speed of wealth accumulation in our new
Golden Age of Capitalism that is keeping family offices
focusing on wealth management rather than holistic
legacy planning. For example, consider how quickly the
following richest billionaires have created their wealth:
Real Time Net Worth from Forbes Billionaire List on Feb
10th, 2016:
Bill Gates, worth $75.1 Billion, founded Microsoft in
1975, average growth over past 41 years – approximately
$1.8 Billion per year or approximately $153 million per
month
Amancio Ortega, worth $69.1 Billion, co-founded
Zara in 1975, average growth over past 41 years –
approximately $1.68 Billion per year or approximately
$140 million per month.
Mark Zuckerberg, worth $44.7 Billion, founded
Facebook in 2004, average growth over past 12 years –
approximately $3.725 Billion per year or approximately
$310 million per month.
Jeff Bezos, worth $44.3 Billion, founded Amazon in 1994,
average growth over past 22 years – approximately
$2 Billion per year or approximately $167 million per
month
Larry Ellison, worth $43.8 Billion, founded Oracle in
1977, average growth over past 39 years – approximately
$1.1 Billion per year or approximately $93 million per
month
Although I can go on and on about billionaires, what is
very clear from my research of the current Billionaires and
past Tycoons is that wealth grows exponentially within
the first generation of entrepreneurs or innovator. The
second, third, and future generations then focus more
on the management of this wealth. This is why family
offices have typically been great tacticians for heirs at
investing money, tax planning, trust management, etc.
However, as change is now happening at exponential
speed, the core foundation of a family office must shift
from simple wealth management to adopting disruptive
technologies and innovative strategies for mastering
intergenerational legacy planning. If we do not begin
empowering family dynasties immediately, then we will
be compounding the shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves cycle
rather than stopping it. In one of my recent articles, Your
Legacy Is Really The History Of Your Heart; I described
the importance of moving from a family of success to a
family of significance as follows:
Everyone’s life journey is comprised of individual days.
Some people are blessed with many days while other
loved ones leave us far too soon. Unfortunately, we
have all fallen into the trap of tracking our life journeys
by plotting them on a calendar, or using the concept of
linear time. The reality is that none of us have a guarantee
of tomorrow. We need to remember that we only have
three days within our possible control - today, which is
the only day within our immediate control, yesterday
which is no longer available and now only a memory,
and the hope of a tomorrow, which is only a promise.
By refocusing our time, talents, and treasures on ONLY
these three days, you can create better tomorrows and
happier yesterdays by simply making and acting upon
wise decisions today.
The challenge with the term “legacy” is that we believe
that legacy is something that we leave behind when we
die… We are confusing success with significance… John
Maxwell says that Success asks, “How can I add value
to myself?” while Significance asks, “How can I add
value to others?” …M. Scott Peck said, “Until you value
yourself, you won’t value your time. Until you value
your time, you will not do anything with it.”
“The real advantage of focusing only on today,
yesterday, and tomorrow is that you will come to the
realization that your legacy is really the history of your
heart. Your DNA is simply the interplay of your Divine
gifts, Natural gifts, and Acquired gifts…We forget that
life is about being present each day, In the end, we must
transform family offices into the curators and facilitators
of new disruptive technologies, implementers of new
discoveries in neuroscience on behavioral management,
and the aggregators of internal and external data
relevant to the family’s sustainable legacy. In my
opinion, the future has never been brighter for family
offices.
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