Wealth of Wisdom

CHAPTER 3Values That Matter

Sharna Goldseker and Danielle Oristian York

No matter how much wealth we have, no matter how many years of experience in the family enterprise, each of us has values. And when we come together to run a family business, govern a family office, or give together to catalyze change in the world, we have to align our values in order to make collective decisions. The challenge, however, is that we often are not conscious of the values that motivate our decision-making, and even if we are, our motivating values don't always line up with those of our family members.

For the past 20 years, 21/64, our nonprofit practice, has built tools to enable family members of all ages and stages to clarify their identities in order to thrive individually and to come to the family table prepared for group dialogue and decision-making. Our most effective (and popular) tool over the years has been our Motivational Values Cards.^© This tool offers families and practitioners a key building block to help individuals and families to act strategically and in alignment with their deeply held values.

Motivational Values Cards

The crises of 2020 and 2021 and related falling away of many of the structures we relied upon for connection, revealed an opportunity for people at every stage and age of life to become clearer about what mattered most to them. Amid a global pandemic, where choices we made had potentially tremendous, and even life-changing impact, we were reminded that our ...