Family offices are often stereotyped as secretive operations, with people in suits speaking quietly about opaque dealings with clients.
That’s in stark contrast to what’s going on at some of them, where executives gather with clients so they all can mingle, whether at a virtual cooking class or on a ski trip. It’s because clients want to meet others in the same financial and family circumstances.
Nancy Marshall, head of family office services at Prime Quadrant in Toronto, says the most common question she gets from her clients is, “What are other families like us doing?”
People tend to trust recommendations from friends and family, and Marshall says families want to connect because they want to know what others are doing and how they’re doing it.
“They take little grains away of, ‘Oh, that actually sounds a lot like what we’re doing,’” Marshall says. “‘Maybe we should be doing something like that, but maybe we tweak it a bit, because our family is just a little bit different.’”
Hosting gatherings for clients can help them solve problems together, says Linda Stalker, director of financial planning at Henderson Partners in Oakville, Ont. “If I have a client who is talking about an issue involving their kids or their parents, we want to be able to say, ‘I know someone who can help you,’” she says.
If clients are considering a particular service, they want references and reassurances that confirm they’re on the right path, Marshall says. Sometimes families will ask to speak with other families in the same situation, or the family office facilitates events that encourage mingling.
One way Prime Quadrant encourages families to meet is through an annual conference and a series of luncheons for their clients. “We have a conference every year, and we invite ultra-affluent families and family offices to it,” Marshall says. Guest speakers also appear.
But it’s not a typical hosted event where families buy a table and sit together. Instead, it’s more relaxed. “They say, ‘Oh, I also have a son who’s 30 and is a lawyer, and here’s how he’s doing things in our family office.’”
Breakout rooms are offered, and families can choose which experts they’d like to hear. “Families get to choose where they go, and then they sit in a room with other families who are also interested in that, and then you get all of this dialogue at the end of the session.”
Henderson Partners hosted a virtual cooking class for their clients during the COVID-19 lockdowns.
“That was great because sometimes families don’t want to be known as a family office and they want to keep their status or their wealth on the ‘down low,’” Stalker says. “It was non-threatening, and the clients were able to have a fun night without anybody asking too many personal questions.”
Executives want to encourage networking, but they don’t want to create cliques.
“Nobody wants to be taken back to high school, so we have some people who know one another, and then others who do not,” she says. “It does help that a lot of families know or know of each other and trust Henderson Partners’ reputation of being a community builder. That encourages clients to attend these events.”
Just like planning a dinner party, putting the right people together means knowing your customers, and that means listening to them, says Stalker. “We ask them what they’d like, whether an event or a gathering would be of interest to them.”
For more intimate events, such as a lengthy trip, Henderson Partners makes sure the participants know each other, or the travellers have made it clear they are outgoing and looking forward to meeting new people.
Another great way to connect is through like-minded industries and topics of interest, says Stalker. One example is developing events for female business owners and entrepreneurs.
Both Stalker and Marshall say their offices are not upselling their clients with these events, and if they did, clients wouldn’t attend. Instead, it’s about building and strengthening relationships, not only with the family offices but between the families, says Marshall.
Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, says Stalker. A client will inevitably make a connection and will want to keep in touch. Or they’ll ask to be included in the next event because they had such a good time meeting other families.
“They leave,” she adds, “and feel like, ‘That was great, because I feel like I was just with my people.’”
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