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Richard Dewes spent 18 years working for the Oppenheimer Family, first as Director for E Oppenheimer and Sons and then Managing Director for Mary Oppenheimer Daughters. Richard led 32 family members across four branches and three generations and has experienced two liquidity transitions within the family. Like many in the position of Family Office Leader, Richard sat on many strategic committees and was responsible for a broad range of activities which included the management of 75 staff as well as an oversight of investments, accounting, tax, legal and insurance. Richard has recently left the Family Office to Co-Found ADIRA Family Office Advisors, an all-Inclusive independent advisory service managing all aspects of wealth, life, and family. Here Richard discusses his former life as Family Office Leader, his journey to the top spot and the lessons learned along the way.

THE IDEAL FAMILY OFFICE LEADER

For me it is all about trust. I know that is possibly a cliché but building and retaining trust with families is crucial as they need to feel comfortable sharing their information with you. You also need integrity, flexibility and the ability to communicate well. Family Office Leaders must be effective communicators as they play a pivotal role in interacting with the team, third parties and the family itself. Flexibility is also important as your week may be lined up at 9am but by ten minutes past you have to take an entirely different direction because priorities have changed. This spontaneity and ability to adapt is the number one thing that differentiates us from a corporate world.

EVOLVING AS A LEADER

Someone once told me that every couple of years you should be evaluating where you are, what you have done and what is coming. You need to look forward as much as you look back and reflect. How are the generations evolving, what events are coming up and ensuring you are aware of them and building a strategy to cope with those things in advance. You need to find out what your family’s plans are for the future. Are they planning on relocating at another time in their lives, where are they sending their children to school?

All of these things will have a knock-on effect in the Family Office and so it is your job as a Leader to keep one eye on the future and plan for eventual situations that have not yet happened or even been spoken about. The biggest component in this conversation is recruitment because it categorically cannot be at the time of the event, it has to be in advance so you can train and find the right people, so the office grows with the family. It’s about taking a step back and looking at the bigger picture.

PRACTICE MAKES  PERFECT

I was in Practice before moving to the commercial side and both experiences certainly shaped my own leadership and led me to taking over the London Family Office aged 33. I think the experience helps massively, especially from a technical perspective. As part of your role as a Leader you need the ability to interact with third party providers and senior professionals within those fields. Whether it is tax, accounting, fiduciary or legal, you understand the technical aspect which enables you to interpret and implement the best course of action to take the family forward. Saying that, I certainly believe it is personality traits that make successful leaders within Family Offices and while a degree of technical knowledge is certainly necessary, it requires a different mindset to encompass that multi-faceted role. It is very difficult to create the ideal career trajectory of a Family Office Leader but a technical skill-set paired with personality is certainly a favourable combination.

LEARNING CURVES

I got promoted from within which is both my biggest achievement and my steepest learning curve. The learning came not just from a technical aspect but culturally too. I had gone from being a member of the team to leading it and that took quite a lot of time to get used to, for all of us. Similarly, the Family Office already knew me and had an expectation that I knew exactly what was expected of me at the top spot when in actual fact, you do not understand a lot of the role until you get there. They gave me the opportunity which was an incredible experience and one that I enjoyed for more than a decade but the first learning for me was managing their expectations.

SUCCESSION PLANNING

It is a conversation certainly being had more with the next generation within Family Offices, who may want change as they see a particular head as their parent’s Leader and may want to take things in a different direction. On the one hand you have longevity and loyalty and on the other, you may want new perspectives and skill sets. While again this is personal to each family, I think you can also achieve the latter through the use of external and independent advisors on your Board to bring in specialist and new perspectives. Equally, you can bring in people to complete independent reviews of your Family Office – its operations, governance and procedures and act as that extra layer of scrutiny, ensuring you are performing well and keeping up with best practices. I do not believe in a time limit but do believe in having open conversations around change and planning ahead for the future in a proactive manner.

Time should always be made for planning ahead, despite the busy family office environment.

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