I had the privilege of attending the first FoundationWise^SM conference at Focus on the Family the week before last.

FoundationWise^SM is meant to help people who “own” and operate private foundations to do a better job.

As I looked at the various workshops available for participants, it seemed to me that there were to primary tracks: one having to do with succession planning–passing on the vision and purpose to the next generation, and one having to do, more, with success on the “business” end of things–keeping good corporate records, ensuring your within the bounds of the law, investing successfully, and so forth. I followed the “succession planning” track.

One of the key questions I hoped to answer had to do with passing responsibility to the next generation: How can I know that they will carry on pursuing a vision that I would want them to pursue? Put another way: if I’m leaving them significant funds for charitable purposes, how can I ensure that they won’t take those funds and potentially turn them to uses possibly diametrically opposed to those for which I would have given them?

I mean, it is so common for nonprofits to wind up doing things very differently than their founders intended!

Intermixed in this larger question: How do we encourage our children in the ways of generosity?I thought some of the answers were very insightful. Here are some of the things that people suggested (not necessarily in order): Read the rest of this entry »

You might wish a family meeting could simply “happen.” No preparation. Let me assure you: that’s a highly unlikely scenario. So how do you prepare?

Here’s what I did in preparation for our family’s first meetings this past week.

*****
Beginning in 2006, when we realized all the kids were grown up, they were beginning to have kids of their own, and our youngest was off at college most of the year, we also woke up to the fact that if we were to spend any significant time with one another, we had to be purposeful about it. And so we set aside a week simply to do “fun things” together–our family’s version of a goodly portion of the Party Tithe.

So in 2006, we made arrangements to see and do and experience all the “best of the best” available in the extended Denver metro area the week before Christmas. Last year, we took the Thanksgiving Week to visit Florence, Italy, together as a family. And this year, Maui, Hawaii. This year’s Family Fun Week took place last week.

Our eldest daughter, seems to be specially gifted in organizing activities and, therefore, has served, all three years, as our unofficial but undoubted “family travel bureau and Family Fun Week organizer.” Several weeks ago, I suddenly realized these Family Fun Weeks could–and, my opinion, should–provide a great opportunity for us to meet together more formally as a family. So I told Amy I wanted to hold some family meetings. She graciously granted me permission to set up three meetings over the course of the week.

In preparation for the meetings, I sent several e-mails to the kids, along with a bunch of documents I prepared from some of the things I’ve been reading. The first one was titled “Preparation for Family Fun Week Family Meetings.” I sent it on Monday the 17th: Read the rest of this entry »

Charles W. Collier, in Wealth in Families, expands on the theme urged by James E. Hughes, Jr. to which I’ve alluded in the past–the idea that, as Collier quotes Hughes (perhaps from a personal interview; I have been unable to find these exact words in either of Hughes’ books themselves): “A family’s duty is to work to preserve the family’s principal wealth-generating assets: its human and intellectual capital. The family leadership and governance structure should provide an environment that values and enhances each family member’s ability to pursue their individual life calling.”

As I have meditated on Hughes’ comments and, more recently, on what Collier says, I have realized, on the one hand, that they call our attention to things most of us ignore to our peril. On the other, I have realized that there are several other asset classes that they don’t really address.

I would like to call your attention to four such non-financial, wealth-generating asset classes. What follows, then, combines a bit of Hughes, a bit of Collier, and serious dollop of John Holzmann as well. Read the rest of this entry »

ADDENDUM as of 2/5/09: While I am still excited about the materials I discuss in this post, it is with great sadness that I feel compelled to note I have discovered there are reasons for caution with respect to the sources referenced herein. With respect to Vision Forum Ministries, I call your attention to the series of articles at Ministry Watchman and Jen’s Gems. And with respect to Geoff Botkin, see Who is Geoffrey Botkin? at the Under Much Grace blog.

[Continued discussion of Vision Forum Ministries' program titled The 200 Year Plan: A Practicum on Multi-Generational Faithfulness.]

I find it difficult to think even five years ahead. So how can I begin thinking 200 years into the future of my family? One secret: just begin! Start writing! Read the rest of this entry »

ADDENDUM as of 2/5/09: While I am still excited about the materials I discuss in this post, it is with great sadness that I feel compelled to note I have discovered there are reasons for caution with respect to the sources referenced herein. [Indeed, though I don't think our daughter, who is mentioned in this post, was aware of the depth of the issues, clearly, she was "on the alert." --I guess I'm suggesting you, too, should probably be on the alert.] With respect to Vision Forum Ministries and Doug Phillips, I call your attention to the series of articles at Ministry Watchman and Jen’s Gems. And with respect to Geoff Botkin, see Who is Geoffrey Botkin? at the Under Much Grace blog.

[Continued discussion of Vision Forum Ministries' program titled The 200 Year Plan: A Practicum on Multi-Generational Faithfulness.]

Start talking about a 200-year plan, and you may find yourself faced with some major opposition! Here’s the story of my first opposition. Read the rest of this entry »

ADDENDUM as of 2/5/09: While I am still excited about the materials I discuss in this post, it is with great sadness that I feel compelled to note I have discovered there are reasons for caution with respect to the sources referenced herein. With respect to Vision Forum Ministries, I call your attention to the series of articles at Ministry Watchman and Jen’s Gems. And with respect to Geoff Botkin, see Who is Geoffrey Botkin? at the Under Much Grace blog.

[Continued discussion of Vision Forum Ministries' program titled The 200 Year Plan: A Practicum on Multi-Generational Faithfulness.]

Sadly, the Vision Forum CD set I purchased provides a sanitized (indeed, in my opinion, overly-sanitized–to the point of being useless) PDF view of the spreadsheet Mr. Botkin showed his audience as he discussed how he built his family’s 200-year plan. (The spreadsheet displayed in the CD shows no headings, no titles, no data at all. It consists, solely, of a grid with a few of the rows and columns colored in. Period. That’s it!)

After persistent attempts to get the company to provide me an example of what Mr. Botkin’s original audience saw, a member of their customer service department wrote back, “The slides originally contained personal information which has since been removed at the request of the speaker. I apologize for any inconvenience that you have experienced and I am sorry that I am currently unable to help you further in this area.”

To their credit, they offered me a refund for the entire CD because this one set of PDFs wasn’t up to par with what I would have hoped for. But I wanted the information more than a refund! So I attempted to contact Mr. Botkin directly in order to acquire a readable example of the spreadsheet and at least an exemplary sample of the data he had developed for his family’s 200-year plan. I was thrilled when he graciously provided what I asked for. I am only now beginning to work through the implications of what he showed me.

Rather than burdening you here with a full rundown of what Botkin sent me; indeed, considering how little I think I really understand the plan, I am numbering this post as #1 in a series. I have no idea how many more posts will come nor how quickly. But let me at least begin working through with you where I am going with our family’s 200-year plan.

*****Perhaps the first and foremost most important feature of creating a 200-year plan as I’m urging, here: it creates a sense of time.

Botkin says he first acquired his own “long view” sense of time when he was a young man and Read the rest of this entry »

As I noted last week, I wrote an official Holzmann Family Foundation Gifting Criteria document and presented it at our family meeting last Thursday.

It was received rather well, all things considered.

Our legacy planner, who has been in the business for over 15 years, said, “This is the best family foundation gifting policy document I have ever seen.”

He wasn’t commenting on the purposes or directions toward which I was suggesting our family ought to give. He said it was the thoroughness and the depth of thought that had gone into it. That was certainly gratifying to hear!

I thought maybe you would like to know what I had included in the document. So here’s an outline of the subject matter covered in the document. Read the rest of this entry »

Will those who follow you–your sons and daughters–fulfill your charitable intentions? Have you ensured they understand what you mean by what you have said in your final documents?

At our last family meeting, in discussing our charitable interests, one of our sons-in-law said he had no idea how we made choices concerning to whom we would give. At the time, I thought that was rather strange. I thought we had delineated our interests and policies rather well in our Family Wealth Letter of Intent. But apparently not.

So our legacy planners drafted what they called a “Holzmann Family Foundation Gifting Criteria” document and asked me, last week, to modify it for our next family meeting (a meeting to be held later this morning).

As our legacy planners explained, the policy statement “was constructed through the conversations that we have had and what you had put in writing in your prior plan. It is intended to be a guide for the foundation and for potential ministries/charitable organizations.”

Oh!

Sarita and I, both, were rather taken aback by what we read. Read the rest of this entry »