Assignment Support for Family Business Advisers

From time to time most of us get stuck, or at least seriously challenged, by a business family in crisis.  We can either try to work our way through it ourselves, consult with colleagues, bring in other collaborative advisers, wait out the situation to see if it resolves itself, let the client implode, or lose the client. The FBI network, and other resources, provide new avenues of highly capable assignment support for family business advisers.

In the event this isn’t enough, or isn’t appropriate, we offer “Guru level”  support to challenged advisers.  Given the decades of experience housed in our faculty’s brains, and the credibility that attaches to recognised experts being called in to provide active support, this may be just the ticket for the troubled situation.

Since FBI does not undertake any consulting work on its own behalf, we recommend working a fee sharing arrangement when this sort of support is required.  Typically, this means the client continues to pay one set of professional fees at a familiar rate.  The lead adviser then remits a portion of said fee to the Guru, usually 50% to 75%, which they can regard as a training and client defence fee.

In the event the client, and/or the adviser, requests significant or continuing involvement by the Guru, a separate collaborative advisory engagement should be entered into, so everybody is clear about the deal.

FBI faculty are under the strictest orders to not compete with other FBI members over existing clients, so whatever eventuates must be willingly agreed by all parties.  If not, and if the FBI adviser has any objections whatsoever to their continuing involvement, the Guru is obliged to withdraw from the engagement, leaving the adviser to work things through with their client.

 

Downloadable Resources

FBI provides members with log-in qualified access to proprietary resources for use in family business advisory practice. These resources can provide assignment support for family business advisers. Note that these are mainly resources developed by FBI faculty over the years for actual use on real family business clients.  They are intended to be used as guides and thought starters, rather than as definitive end products.

Please go to the Member’s Zone for a full list of available resources and materials.