Multi-Generational Families / Identity and Shared Purpose
The Family Story and Shared Identity
A family cannot remain coherent around assets alone. It needs a truthful account of what those assets mean, how they came to exist and what responsibilities accompany them.
What still holds us together once the founder is no longer the centre of the family?
The founding generation often carries the family story instinctively. It remembers the risks, sacrifices, relationships and accidents that shaped the enterprise or fortune. Later generations inherit the result without necessarily sharing the experience that gave it meaning.
If the family story is never made explicit, it becomes vulnerable to two opposite errors. It may be idealised until younger family members cannot recognise themselves within it, or forgotten until the family is connected only by distributions and legal structures.
A useful family story is neither mythology nor marketing. It includes achievement and error, privilege and obligation, continuity and change. Its purpose is to give family members context, not to prescribe a single identity.
Practical principles
What good stewardship requires
- 01
Recover the history before declaring the values.
- 02
Include difficult chapters as well as celebrated ones.
- 03
Allow different branches and generations to recognise themselves.
- 04
Connect the story to present responsibilities and future choices.
How Adamas helps
Independent judgement, translated into workable arrangements.
We work alongside the family’s incumbent advisers and institutions, bringing the human, ownership and structural questions into one coherent frame.
- Interview family members across generations and branches
- Distil a credible family narrative and ownership history
- Facilitate conversations about shared identity and difference
- Translate history into a practical statement of purpose
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