Family Offices are very finely balanced ecosystems that are seen as attractive targets by those outside but in many cases from inside (with internal fraud). The risks to a family office are many and varied and not just associated with investment risk. Ignore them at your peril.
There are very few examples or a track record of Investment Family Offices (those who have sold their operating business) succeeding over multiple generations. You have to ask the question, Why? Poor Decision-Making/ Poor judgement? Greed? Risk? Breakdown in communication? Vanity?
Tread very carefully into the future and monitor both the risks internally and externally. There have been many casualties that have gone before. These family office eco-systems are not easy organisms to keep alive. They certainly are more stable if you still retain an operating business.
My one piece of advice is 'stick to your knitting' - stick to what you know and do not over diversify into things you know nothing about. That way you can mitigate many of the risks that the family offices have suffered from in the past.
While advisers and banks alike are often of the opinion that family offices have much to gain from better a understanding and management of “non-investment risk”, adherence to such an approach among family offices remains patchy. And amid the usual family rows, divorces and “key man” issues, there are other, perhaps less obvious, potential threats to consider, including the rise in the use of social media,
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