Resilience in the Family Office

You may never have to experience hard times yourself. But if you build the appropriate knowledge base and pass it on to others, and encourage them to do likewise, it is likely that sooner or later, to someone somewhere over the next thousands years, that knowledge will matter.

Carol Deppe – The Resilient Gardener

If you already know me, or have read some of my content, you might be aware of the values that are dear to my heart : kindness, purpose, resilience.

Resilience has become a sort of trendy word, but what exactly does it mean?

It can be defined as the ability to successfully adapt, cope with, react and recover from adversity.

I like to remind the fact that resilience is as much a process as it is an outcome. And this is probably why I find it so fascinating and versatile.

It goes much beyond emergency response, survival skill, or even personal development. Reducing it to just those, would be considering resilience as a desirable outcome, something static as a goal to achieve.
In reality, resilience being a process, I believe it is much more similar to a culture, or an attitude : a way to think, lead, and act.

In my life, I experienced many hardships. Traveling in different places since childhood, I also witnessed other people’s hardships. Both persectives allowed me to reflect, maybe more than average, about how to become more resilient.

Why is resilience relevant to the Family Office?

Resilience is relevant to so many aspects of our lives : mental, health, financial, social, and much more.

Some people also face more challenging life experiences because of their personal situation, or because they are part of a minority for example.

It is also relevant to many professional fields such as the enforcement workers (military, police, security…), the lifesavers (firefighters, emergency…), but also the entrepreneurs, the gardeners/farmers, and many more.

In the family office, there are several operational aspects that are sensitive to resilient leadership :

• Risk management
• Financial investment
• Estate planning
• Personal safety
• Cybersecurity
• Human resources

Each of those can be affected by adverse events of all kind, leaving the FO, and ultimately the family, at risk.

Bringing resilience in the family office, and implementing it as a true way of life, can make the world of a difference in how we respond to adversity.

Simple tips to become more resilient

I will not enter into operational details such as risk prevention, business continuity planning, crisis management techniques or threat response, because there is a lot of documentation about it, and I hope if you work in or manage a family office, you are already pretty aware of those.

My perspective here is more to point out some elements that are often under the radar, or not taken into account, when we think about resilience.

1. Emotional agility : When we are not in touch with our emotions, we end up being too rigid. This often leads to a denial blocage, a bad reaction or a negative mindset when we face adversity.
   Just as the reed bends but does not break, we are much stronger when we stay emotionally agile! Think about self-awareness!
   
2. Horizontal leadership : When we operate through traditional vertical leadership, the figure of the leader has too much power over the team members, disminishing their own capabilities. In case the adverse event happening involves the leader, we are left with a distraught team.
   By embracing horizontal leadership, we empower each member of the team to take actions, step up with initiatives, and support each other, spreading « management risk ». Think about healthy communication!
   
3. Diversity : When we hire « yes people », or people from similar background and style to surround us, we create a unique thinking environment. This is risky because we become blind to criticism and difference. When we open to diversity, we bring creativity in our team, and we open our minds to other possibilities, which is especially interesting in risk management. Think about neurodivergence!
   
4. Growth mindset : When we have a fixed mindset, we become excellent at managing a fixed situation, hoping things won’t change so we are not challenged. By embracing a growth mindset, we keep learning during our career and life, acknowledging things do change and evolve for the best. Within a team, people can share skills, and they build on synergies. Think about shared knowledge!
   
5. Intentionality : When we face challenges, it shakes our foundations, our beliefs, and even our identity. If we are not intentional and are used to always respond to opportunities instead of creating our reality, hard times might left us clueless. When we are intentional, we build our longterm vision, and learn to see a step further than the hardship we are experiencing in the moment. Intentionality is a superpower that drives us towards our objectives, and helps us see clearly the direction we need to follow. Think about being in control!
   

You can see how those elements are to be embedded into the everyday operations, as well as the longterm vision of the family office.

By communicating openly about it within the FO, and within the family members, we can help build not only personal, but a shared resilience, which will be beneficial to each aspect of the spectrum of activities in the FO.

More over, if we follow on by documenting the process, we can serve others, our whole industry, and maybe help future generations be better prepared, which rounds up to my initial quote by Carol Deppe.

And you, how do you approach resilience in your family office?