Stewardship is a key part of the family culture of the Bush family, owners of the manufactured food company Bush Brothers & Company. Through Shoebox Private Trust Company, their family office and private trust company, the family aims to instill the value of stewardship in all its members.
“One of the reasons that they wanted the trusts to be established was so that they could maintain family ownership and continue to be stewards of this company,” says John Seckman, president of Shoebox Private Trust Company. The family takes the view that the company is there first for the consumers, then for its approximately 800 employees, and finally for the owners. “They are third in line: They are the stewards. Our mission at Shoebox has been to support, encourage, and nurture that concept of stewardship within our family.”
Defining stewardship
Stewardship, for the Bush family, is intertwined with family members’ ownership of the company.
“Because our shareholders don’t work in the business, we work hard to explain to them what their role is as an owner,” Seckman says. “They’re stewards of this company and the enterprise. We tell them that the concept of stewardship is that this is not about you: You have a role to play for the benefit of others.”
For younger shareholders especially, it’s important to realize that there are responsibilities that come with being a beneficiary of a trust.
“We tell them, ‘Your willingness to step into your responsibilities as an owner is part of what helps you enjoy being a beneficiary of this,’” Seckman says. “They have a seat at the table, and how they manage own personal financial affairs can eventually affect the company. We bring that stewardship home to them to say, ‘You have an important role to play in the future of this company, and it’s called being a steward.’”
Family members generally work, though not in the business.
“If our family members became dependents, where they were all consuming every bit of income that came out of the company and not creating any of their own earned income, that can be a kiss of death for a family-owned business,” Seckman says. “If you can’t keep up with the demands of the family, you eventually have to sell the business.”
Engaging the rising generation
Stewardship is a complex aspect of family culture — and it is about more than how family members handle their wealth.
Younger family members often view discussions of stewardship as their parents’ or grandparents’ purview, but Seckman and his team at Shoebox are quick to explain that stewardship starts when they begin their adult lives.
Coaching starts with simple steps young people can take to manage their own affairs.
“It’s simple things: Do you have a will? Do you have a balance sheet? Do you know kind of what you’re worth? Do you have goals for what you plan to earn and what you plan to spend? Do you have savings goals?” Seckman says.
They recommend that family members set aside some of the trust distributions they receive and build their own nest egg so that they can ultimately be financially independent, independent from the trusts.
The family office emphasizes that it’s important for family members to do their part.
“We’re not really helping them grow as individuals if we’re doing everything for them,” Seckman says. “We encourage and equip. We’re not here to entitle.”
Seckman says the family office’s work with the rising generation is “a synergistic relationship.”
“When people understand they have a role and a responsibility the inheritance part of it isn’t as threatening to them,” Seckman says. “For people that don’t understand their role, that just get an inheritance, sometimes it has a negative impact on their life. We work very hard to not allow that to happen.”
With 90 family members, it can be difficult to reach all of them where they are to talk about stewardship.
“We try to find some area in their life where they could use some advice or have a need. Maybe they just started a job and they’ve got a 401(k), or they just got engaged, or they just had a baby,” Seckman says. “We are typically able to reach out and say, ‘Hey, we could help with that.’ That creates engagement. And then the more we get engaged, the more we develop a relationship.”
This is more effective than a one-size-fits-all approach.
“Our goal is to be a trusted advisor, and it takes time to build that credibility with them,” Seckman says.
Conversations about stewardship are not one-time events, either.
“We are always stressing to them that stewardship is a verb — it’s an action word,” Seckman says. “It’s something you practice all the time — you don’t do it once and stop. We’re there to remind them of that — and help them do it.”