Customer Reviews

Family Wealth--Keeping It in the Family: How Family Members and Their Advisers Preserve Human, Intellectual, and Financial Assets for Generations

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Reading James E. Hughes Jr.'s book is like sitting down in an easy chair with brass rivets gleaming in burgundy leather, in a trusted old family friend's parlor, to obtain a kindly word of advice. You can almost smell the pipe tobacco and taste the brandy as you read. Hughes gently and wisely guides people who want to preserve their family's wealth on how to think beyond the current fiscal year. This book is genuine and straightforward, with insights gained over many years. Hughes covers creating a family mission statement, instituting a family bank or private trust company, mentoring the next generation, family governance, philanthropy and much more. His most important contribution, however, is the perspective he offers on the human side of the equation. Even the richest families are doomed to squander their inheritances, he cautions, unless they recognize the importance of the intellectual and human development of their family members. We highly recommends this book of sage advice to anyone who hopes to keep it all in the family.

Studying this book and sharing copies of it with some of my cousins really opened my eyes to the potential in my extended family. We don't have substantial financial wealth, though there are a few deep pockets. We have several people in my generation who have achieved outstanding success in life, including one who's a major general in the Army and another who is a star on Broadway.

More than that, we have six generations of people who are used to knowing each other and working together because of a piece of recreation property that my great-grandfather bought 100 years ago.

That property has kept us together for 100 years but it won't be enough for another 100 years. This book got me thinking about what we can do for the next 100 years, and I see lots of opportunity to develop the "human capital" in this family and to back those things with financial strength.

Most of all, this book stimulated my thinking "outside the box" and provided the springboard for family discussions that will let my siblings and cousins and I create something with the potential to keep making this family stronger for another half-dozen generations.

For that, I think buying this book was probably the very best family investment I could make.

"Family Wealth" by James E. Hughes, is a sensitive, detailed blueprint for families who have acquired wealth and want to use it to create a dynastic organization that will preserve their family and its wealth for many generations to come. This book explains in detail the steps necessary for long-term success and guides the reader through the creation of mission statements, plans for family governance, creating a mutually rewarding relationship between trustees and beneficiaries, philanthropy, mentoring, and the establishment of private trust companies. Hughes emphasizes the need for long-term thinking as well as short-term relationship management within the family since decisions made regarding personal and intellectual development will be just as important as financial decisions to the long-term future of the family organization. This book offers an excellent starting point for financial planners as well as estate and trust attorneys who want to address and serve the interests of the wealthy. I recommend it heartily.

As a great philosopher once said "I am not ashamed to say that I have learned the good news of the truth and am called to proclaim it to others." The truth is Family Wealth: Keeping It In The Family, is the clear result of the author's extensive discernment and constitutes that rare slice of my profession which rises to the level of a ministry. The beauty of this work lies in the author's ability to state concepts with such simplicity and flow, the reader may be lead to conclude "these insights are so patently obvious I should have discovered them myself." Many of us in the estate planning profession, however, have not previously done so. Having invested 20 years in this profession I can attest that many people with reasonable career abilities can accumulate considerable sums of wealth. Moreover, a reasonably competent estate planning attorney can draft the business and estate planning documents to pass that wealth from one generation to the next. Yet after reading Mr. Hughes' book twice (and garnering increasing insights and applications after each journey) it is manifest that merely fulfilling the professional expectations taught in law school will henceforth be insufficient to deal with the interpersonal dynamics and relationship issues which must be addressed in order to wealth preserve. Moreover, this process must be rekindled and nurtured at each generation level. I now understand that to be a truly excellent estate planner, the issues in this book must be addressed by estate planner and client. Your clients need not have the wealth of a Warren Buffett or Bill Gates to benefit from the wisdom of this book and I hope it will raise the standards for the profession as a whole as it did for me.

Douglas E. Barnes, Trust Officer and member, State Bar of Wisconsin.

Most financial planners are very talented at finding ways to avoid, reduce and defer taxes. The better planners can also do a wonderful job of steering your money towards investments that will have appropriate risk-rewards characteristics for your preferences. Beyond that, some kind planners will also help you talk through the problems of your drug addict son and alcoholic daughter. But no one, in my experience, will help you think you how to nurture your family in all of its dimensions.

Family Wealth breaks through those limitations to suggest that those who head a family should be concerned about all aspects of future generations . . . especially their human, intellectual and social developments . . . as well as being sure that the resources will be there to nurture them. Mr. Hughes suggests a time frame of at least 100 years for this perspective. Otherwise, the global fear that the family will arise from one downtrodden existence to fall down into the same existence in only 3 or 4 generations will turn out to be true.

In Family Wealth, Mr. Hughes poses the questions you should be asking about your family and proposes processes to help you turn the answers to those questions into reality.

Beyond that, the book informs those who are donors, trustees, advisors and beneficiaries of financial planning what their roles should be with one another and how those roles can be developed through cooperative effort.

A hundred years is a long time to see how this theory works out, so Mr. Hughes will not live long enough to see if his ideas work over several generations. But he has done his best to draw on well-known examples of families who have prospered for a long time.

I highly recommend this book to those who want to be responsible to their families, advisors to families, those who provide services to family trusts and those who benefit from inherited money and trusts. Your life will be changed very much for the better!

I've read a lot of books and recommended them to my friends and family. This one, I bought for my partners and family. As someone who deals daily with great family wealth, it is invaluable to learn from the experiences of others. There is a wealth of ideas in this book, not just for those with great financial assets, but for those families with great human capital. I would recommend it for anyone who deals with family wealth: attorneys, CPA's, trust officers, and members of families who want to preserve their family wealth (financial, human or intellectual capital).

As a principal owner and leader of investment management and multi-disciplined financial planning organization, this book has been an invaluable resource. In fact, this book has significantly impacted the direction of our firm.

When faced with a client who was selling his business for close to nine figures, I realized that I needed to become familiar with the issues this family would be facing. By luck, I happened to find this book by James Hughes, Jr. Soon after reading the book, I was introduced to a perfect person to collaborate with regarding helping families with family governance issues. That person subsequently joined our firm.

So far, I've bought over two dozen copies and frequently hand them out to new business prospects. It is on the top of my reading list for the families we impact. As well, we have adopted as our mantra that "a family's wealth is comprised of human capital, intellectual capital and financial capital. And, that the best use of a family's financial capital is to nurture the other two."

Thanks, James, for sharing your knowledge and helping me with my strategic business planning!

Buy the 2004 edition published by Bloomberg Press and don't waste your money on this. The 2004 edition has much more material.

MY RATING SYSTEM:

* - if you have to chose between torture and reading this book, then you might want to consider reading the book - although it depends on just how severe the torture would be.

** - if you've lost your job and have quite a bit of free time on your hands, and don't have anything else better to do, then you might want to consider reading this book; don't expect to learn much or really be entertained. It will however, help you pass the time until your death.

*** - meh...I'm indifferent. Reading this book will not alter your life in any significant way, yet it is not so horrendously dreadful that your taking the time to read it will be a complete waste of time.

**** - Good book to great book zone here. You should probably read this book if you have some spare time. This book could be interesting, entertaining, or informative.

***** - Outstanding book! Make time to read this book - you'll learn or be entertained or intrigued. The book might even be good enough to provide original or helpful insights into the world that we live in.

REVIEW:

I have read many books on the subject of family businesses, and this book has done an excellent job in recognizing that the development of human and intellectual capital in families is a precondition for the continued development of financial capital.

The book has a slightly more philosophical tone than some of the other family business books I've read (such as some of John Ward's excellent books), but nonetheless is an extremely valuable read to anyone involved in a family business setting (or serving as an advisor to such family businesses).

Hughes places a great deal of emphasis on the 'human' elements of family businesses, and suggests that the families should be primarily concerned with the development of the human and intellectual capital within the family. According to Hughes, such an emphasis will enable continued growth of financial capital, however many families make the mistake of placing the primary emphasis on the financial, rather than on these human and intellectual elements. Throughout the book he suggests that the family's role is to support each individual in their own pursuits of happiness, and that doing so will ensure the growth of all the classes of family capital - human, intellectual, and financial. Throughout the book he also discusses a number of other themes and ideas including: the importance of education, shared values, long term planning and group participation; the distinction between ownership and control; the different types of forms of government and the need to select a particular form to govern the family; the various roles of philanthropy; and, the use of, and complexities of using trusts as a family planning vehicle.

In summary, the book offers an insightful look into the ideas that have enabled many families to see to it that the notion of 'shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations' does not apply to their family business.

This is a must read for those of you who have or plan to have over $5 Million in Net worth. If you want to fulfill your responsibility to your family and give them the tools necessary to carry on your legacy, this is a great starting point.