Sophie Sherwin is a private Personal Assistant for a Single Family Office based in London. With over a decade of experience in serving a Principal and their family, she speaks to Agreus in this Day in the Life of Interview to offer an insight into the everyday of a Family Office PA. Here she offers the recipe for Family Office success while telling us how she makes the impossible, possible and why judgment must be left at the door.
Can you describe your role in a sentence or two?
I am a multitasking magician who hits the ground running pre-empting every task and who throws their job description out of the window every day.
How does your day begin? Is there a routine or ritual you swear by?
I do not have a schedule as such but I do meditate. I wake up about half an hour early and use the time between sleep and consciousness to ground myself for the day. I also like to walk to work where possible so I can move my body because while this role is highly rewarding, it can also be extremely stressful and so learning to move negative energy through your body is key.
What does your everyday look like?
Not being diverted on your way into the office and being able to arrive on-time to turn on the computer is as routine as it gets for life within a Family Office. You can get called to an emergency somewhere else on your way which changes the course of your day but if that is not the case and I get to the office on time, I check my emails, create a priority list and try to get started on that before I receive my first phone call of the day. The phone call will almost always give me the newer priority list which I then have to navigate and decipher which are more urgent to the principle.
The only similarity day-to-day is that I am working for a Family Office, the rest can differ wildly which certainly keeps life interesting.
How does life as a Family Office PA differ to being a PA within different industries?
In the Family Office environment, you are project-managing somebody’s life.
You need to be completely multifaceted and carry a wide knowledge of a variety of different things. From plumbing to ailments, dissecting doctor’s notes to fixing staff issues to making travel arrangements. Organising visas to finding the best restaurants and sourcing unique items. You need to know a lot about everything and if you do not know the answer, you act like you do and then find out later.
The biggest difference to a more corporate environment is how intimately you get to know your Principal and their family. In a traditional workplace, you see only the parts of a person that they wish to share but when you are working behind closed doors, you will have to face parts of another person’s life that you do not always agree with. For instance, if you are vegan and your Principal hunts, you will have to reconcile this. You have to enter their lives with no judgement and grit your teeth and allow things to happen because even though you may disagree or find a better way of doing things, you are a moving part in their life.
While you are exposed to what is essentially your bosses’ life in a way you would not be in a corporate setting, you need to allow it to build slowly. Family Offices reward loyalty and longevity and if you have those innate qualities within you then you will thrive within the environment but it does not happen overnight. You must rely on the history of the paperwork that exists and not be afraid to ask the Principal and their family what they think, you are managing their lives and therefore require their input.
How would you describe your professional character in three words?
Patient, flexible and intuitive.
Is this the recipe for Family Office success?
There are other words to describe success in a Family Office, one is discretion.
It is also about finding the balance of when to step in and when to stand back. You simply cannot be the centre of attention in their lives but you need to allow them to know you are there whenever they need you and for whatever they need you for.
Flexibility is the most important skill-set in any employee because you have to juggle multiple tasks at any given time and the second most important is intuition. Making the Family Office a success comes down to being able to pre-empt things that may go wrong and having a solution ready. You must always be solution-based or at least have potential fixes in the backburner. Having a strong network is also very important as a private PA as they help you to make the impossible, possible.
For any potential candidates reading, what advice can you offer about becoming a private PA?
You are constantly learning and cannot be stagnant.
I have an insatiable appetite for new experiences which helps me because my curiosity to learn about new things, though they might seem irrelevant at the time, might come up in the office environment and help me to solve a task for the Principal. Being curious is a necessity in the Family Office space as is having discretion.
When I first started out in the Family Office, I was given one piece of advice which is applicable to any environment: Do not ever tell people who you work for. Of course you always need to be careful and keep certain aspects confidential but by not disclosing who you work for, you can at least be a little freer in talking about your day to friends and acquaintances.
For any clients considering hiring a Personal Assistant, what value might they add?
You will get back your time and not just time but quality time.
The majority of Principals are in the position they are in today because they have made an idea a great success. As a result, they are often incredibly hard-working and driven individuals who find delegating difficult, even when it comes to small tasks that end up consuming a lot of their time. Even if they delegate one task to a private PA which would have otherwise taken them two to three hours, that is two to three hours they can now spend either at home with their family or redirected to a more pressing matter.
You also streamline with a PA. As I mentioned earlier, it is like project-management, you can tell your PA I need to turn the office into a house and they’ll get it done for you by deadline. Whether they achieve it alone, working with another Project Manager or alongside other staff, they are your one port of call. You streamline with them and save money and time.
What has been your most memorable moment within the Family Office space?
One of my favourite things about working for a Family Office is being asked the impossible and making it happen.
I was two years in and my Principal called me at 9am to ask me to source a 1960s formula one car to buy. This was 10 years ago where technology was still a work in progress and Google turned around and rolled their eyes at me as much as I did to my Principal. By 4.30pm I had a broker with the car ready to sell. I cannot remember how I did it but what I will always remember is the feeling of satisfaction that I made it happen.
One of the frustrations about the role however is that you never know the end-result. I never saw the car, I never knew who it was for and I certainly did not get to drive it but was a very memorable day indeed and if you are happy to play a part in the story but not always know its conclusion, you can be very happy in the Family Office.
Is there anything else you would like to add to the conversation about a day in your life?
Being a private PA is an enigma.
Everyone wants to understand the role you play but you simply cannot explain it with words. There are courses out there that try to teach it but the only thing you can learn outside of the four walls of a Family Office is how to use practical tools such as Word, excel, PowerPoint and so on.
Nothing can prepare you for life in a Family Office however, as I said earlier, Family Offices require loyalty and longevity and if you have those innate qualities within you, you will thrive.