Navigating the
Peaks of Family Legacy
In the complex world of ultra-high-net-worth family offices, hidden challenges can arise. At Summit Culture we help families bridge generational divides and turn tensions into solutions, ensuring your legacy thrives.
Navigating the Peaks
of Family Legacy
In the complex world of ultra-high-net-worth family offices, hidden challenges can arise. At Summit Culture we help families bridge generational divides and turn tensions into solutions, ensuring your legacy thrives.
Navigating the Peaks
of Family Legacy
In the complex world of ultra-high-net-worth family offices, hidden challenges can arise. At Summit Culture we help families bridge generational divides and turn tensions into solutions, ensuring your legacy thrives.
Human Capital
Solutions
Family businesses and ultra-high-net-worth (UHNW) family offices are often celebrated for their unity and legacy. Yet, in our experience, beneath the surface, unaddressed tensions, communication gaps and generational divides can threaten their longevity.
Summit Culture bring objectivity, expertise and culturally sensitive strategies to navigate these challenges.
Key Challenges in Family Businesses
Hidden Conflicts in
"Harmonious" Families
Example 1
A European family business member, perceived herself as collaborative, discovered her siblings resented her dominance. Despite open communication norms, internal biases blinded the family to escalating tensions.
Example 2
A “conflict-free” cousin consortium faced sudden resignations when unspoken frustrations boiled over despite formalised, longstanding practices of family meetings. The absence of proactive dialogue mechanisms left critical issues unaddressed.
Succession Planning
and Governance
Only 30% of family businesses survive into the third generation, often due to inadequate succession frameworks.
Asian families, in particular, struggle with formalising governance. Patriarchs may resist relinquishing control, while Western-educated heirs push for modernisation.
Cultural Nuances
in Communication
European families may openly debate, but Asian families often suppress dissent to preserve harmony. Summit Culture help bridge this gap by creating safe spaces for dialogue and mediating inter-generational clashes.
The Summit Culture Value Proposition
What We Do
1. Tailored Leadership Development
We can train ‘next-gen’ leaders using world-class models blending performance coaching with real-world challenges. This prepares heirs to take-over whilst balancing tradition with innovation – critical in today’s fast-moving world.
2. Impartial Facilitation
We help identify blind spots, such as overdominant members or disengaged heirs, through engaged / familial context-driven dialogues. We can help highlight and resolve emotional ‘landmines’ and structure leadership transitions.
3. Structured Conflict Resolution
We can help implement frameworks like family constitutions or governance/advisory boards to formalise decision-making. This helps prevent abrupt departures, as seen in the cousin consortium example above.
4. Cultural Sensitivity
In Asia, we respect hierarchical dynamics while gently introducing global best practices. Younger Asian heirs often face resistance when advocating innovation for formal family businesses and offices.
Using learnings from real-life cases and our wealth of experience working with Family Businesses,
we deliver real results
Drawing from case studies and our wealth of experience working with Family Businesses, our methodology includes:
Diagnostic Workshops
We help uncover hidden tensions through facilitated family meetings, leveraging tools such as the Hogan suite of diagnostics and 360 degree feedback.
Succession Roadmaps
We help align family values with governance structures harmonising wealth and harmonising well-being.
Phased Leadership Transitions
We facilitate processes and roadmaps to ensure smooth handovers. Our focus is on bridging generational divides to provide strategic advantages.
The Last
Word...
In our experience, Family Legacies thrive when tough questions are asked early – and impartially. Summit Culture provide the expertise to transform undercurrents into opportunities, ensuring legacies endure across generations and borders. As one of our senior family clients noted, “You cannot fire your relatives but you can empower them with clarity.”
Explore our tailored human-centric solutions to safeguard your family’s legacy.
Contact our specialists for more information: enquiries@summitculture.com