Supporting Trustees in stewarding assets & relationships
While meeting evolving responsibilities & beneficiary expectations
As stewards of assets for family beneficiaries, Trustees and Trust Company Directors play a critical role in value preservation.
We support them in fulfilling this responsibility, with an emphasis on maintaining harmony amongst beneficiaries.
How we support trustees across critical responsibilities
Trustees take a wide range of approaches to their role, and we can support them across a variety of critical areas:
Performance and governance: The performance trust-held assets, with emphasis on asset class allocations, portfolio strategies, operating business strategy and overall governance issues.
Beneficiary alignment: Understanding beneficiary interests and helping maintain alignment across the overall beneficiary group.
Beneficiary development: Helping beneficiaries understand their current and future roles, and what skills and capabilities they will require. Helping in their development – personally and professionally; individually and collectively.
Communication: Helping to establish constructive communication amongst all elements of the system. This includes between the businesses/financial investments, and between the Trustee and the Beneficiaries and their families.
A collaborative approach to establishing clarity & consensus
We see both the trustee and beneficiaries as our client, working in the interests of the collective. We seek to understand the specifics of how the system works and any constraints imposed by the trust structures and geographies.
We start by identifying potential challenges and listening – to individuals and in facilitated meetings. We ensure discussions are fact based; how the trusts work, what assets the trust owns, how the assets have performed, how the governance works in theory and practice, and what the expectations are for the future.
We work with the Trustee and Beneficiaries to resolve key challenges and to develop a roadmap for their resolution.
Common challenges we help Trustees overcome
Key issues that Trustees face, and that we help with, include:
Changing roles for family.
The need to better understand and work with more beneficiaries.
The increasing size of the asset pool.
The need to diversify assets.
The need to ensure the harmony of the beneficiaries.
The need to help beneficiaries grow and develop.
Redefining structures & processes
As the legislation around Trusts evolves, the roles the family/beneficiaries can play and the scope of the role of the Trustee change. What has worked before may not work in the future.
We can help in building consensus around future roles and creating the new structures and processes required.
Aligning investment strategy with beneficiary interests
Beneficiaries expect their Trustee to safeguard and grow the assets under the Trust’s ownership. For complex multi-asset portfolios, or where multiple managers or advisors are involved, we act as an independent partner to the Trustee, helping to structure a strategic review process, articulate a revised set of guiding investment principles, and support with the development of an appropriate execution strategy (e.g. multi- or single- advisor).
We work to help determine the best governance structures to oversee the investments and to support the strategic implementation of the policy.
Supporting the development of successors
Trustees have traditionally focused on administration, investment and distributions. Today, more and more are moving to assume responsibilities for beneficiary wellbeing and development. We have extensive experience in working on developing successor generations and can support the Trustee in this role.
Trustees value the role of beneficiaries in the company and on boards. As beneficiaries become more distant from the assets, their development as executives and future board members can become more challenging. We help by developing specific policies for beneficiary employment and programmes to fast-track board development skills.
Who we are
Independent strategic advisors to Owners
Acanthite Partners is an independent, specialist advisory firm dedicated to addressing the unique situations faced by family-owned groups. Our mission is to help families make the right decisions for their business and investments and protect their legacies for future generations.
We create lasting solutions, enabled by decades of experience and an intimate understanding of family dynamics.
CLIENT STORY
Actively developing the next generation
A Trustee of a substantial family holding structure sought support with a challenge familiar to many families in business: how to involve the next generation in governance without compromising board quality.
While confident in the performance of the current governance model and the calibre of both family and non-family directors, the Trustee was looking ahead. As the current generation started planning to step back, they wanted to appoint the next generation to board roles when they reached their forties (they were in their thirties at the time). The priority was to begin development now, without any perceived or actual dilution in governance standards.