What is generational transition in a family office?

Generational transition is the process by which a family transfers power, ownership, and responsibility from one generation to the next. In a family office context, this includes decisions about who leads the family office, how assets are restructured, how governance is updated, and how the family's unity is preserved across the transition. It is widely considered the most consequential and highest-risk moment in a family office's lifecycle.

How long does a generational transition take?

A well-managed generational transition typically takes between one and four years, depending on the complexity of the family structure, the number of beneficiaries, the range of assets, and the degree of consensus within the family. Westwick works at the family's pace rather than imposing a timeline, ensuring decisions are durable rather than expedient.

What can go wrong during a generational transition?

The most common failure modes are: loss of family unity when branches disagree on governance or asset allocation; inadequate preparation of the next generation for responsibility; poor communication between generations; and advisors who optimise for tax or legal efficiency at the expense of family cohesion. Westwick's role is to hold the process together across all these dimensions.

Our work

Generational transition

The hardest moment in the life of a family — and the one most often broken by the office that should support it.

Every family office is built around a generation. When the family moves to the next, the office is the place where that move actually takes shape. The wealth, the structure, the relationships, the discretion — all are tested. Most families come to us either too late (the transition has already created cracks) or just early enough (the founders have decided, but no one has translated the decision into operations).

Our role is at the intersection of what the family has decided and what the office must become.

When this happens

The founder is preparing to step back, and the office still runs around them.
A succession has happened, and the new principals feel they are not fully in control — or even pushed away from — the office they have inherited.
The next generation is aligned but the systems, mandates and team were built for the previous one.
A family business has been sold, and what remains is structure without purpose.

What we do

Bring unspoken assumptions onto the table — across generations, branches, and the existing office team.
Translate the family's decisions into a new operating model: who decides what, when, and with whom.
Manage the office through the change — including the people who built it under the previous chapter.
Hand over a stabilised office to the next generation — making sure that nobody, internal or external, stays on unless they are fully realigned to serve the new principals. The result is a working framework, not a fragile inheritance.

How we engage

These mandates run twelve to twenty-four months. We work alongside the current principals as they step into transmission mode, and we empower the new generation to take the seat — building both the soft skills and the hard skills they need. From those sessions we draw a clear action plan and a roadmap, so the office follows the transmission that is taking place at the level of the family.

← Back to the three moments

If this is your moment.

Conversations with Westwick are strictly confidential. They commit the family to nothing — and us to discretion.

Talk to us