The 12th Annual UBS Family Office Summit in New York brought together the Family Office community. The summit provided a platform for thought leaders to embark on discussions that concern the Family Office space.
Day 2 of the event was split across two key sessions – Investment Insights and Family Office Strategy and Governance. Paul Westall, Co-Founder of Agreus, was involved in the governance-focused session, alongside Mark Tepsich, Family Office Design and Governance Strategist at UBS. Together, they explored one of the most intricate topics in Family Office management: the intersection of human capital and investment governance.
The discussion was centred on the complexities of investment governance within Single Family Offices. Unlike institutional investors, Family Offices often include multiple stakeholders, family members, trustees, and advisors, each with differing goals, risk profiles, and timelines. This diversity makes structured governance essential.
Key governance tools, such as Investment Policy Statements (IPS), were discussed, with 54% of Family Offices reporting having one in place. Paul and Mark also discussed the importance and structure of Investment Committees (ICs). It is said that the effectiveness of IC increases significantly when committees include independent, third-party professionals, they have also explored the ideal profiles of third-party professionals.
Additional themes included compensating family members effectively and the clear value of annual self-review processes, which are currently only carried out by 25% of Family Offices but correlate strongly with effectiveness. Throughout the session, Paul and Mark have also touched upon some interesting statistics from the soon-to-be-released Family Enterprise Governance Report.
The session concluded with a clear message: strong investment governance stems from intentional and structured practices tailored to each family’s unique needs.
We would like to thank UBS for hosting such a thoughtful and well-organised summit. It was a pleasure to be involved and to contribute to the ongoing conversation around strengthening Family Office governance globally.