Talk About Legacy

By: Sam Davis In: 2010 Family Philanthropy Conference| Family Philanthropy

2 Feb 2010

In the family philanthropy field, we often urge families to talk about their legacies and shared values. We expect that all families will just take our suggestion and engage in healthy, helpful discussions. Some families may be able to do just that, but many avoid such discussions as long as possible.

In the Getting Aligned Across Generations workshop, Allison Sole and Julie Morton succeeded in demonstrating to a room full of strangers how productive and rewarding these personal discussions can be. Using 21/64’s “Picture Your Legacy” card deck to stimulate thinking, participants partnered with each other and shared key elements of their desired legacies.

In other interactive exercises, participants learned the importance of active listening and shared their own peak experiences in relating to family members. Participants also learned how to identify triggers for their own negative or “trough” experiences and how to respond with adaptive behaviors.

To reinforce the principles learned in the workshop, participants were asked to note in writing and share with one another at least one initiative he or she would undertake within 48 hours of leaving the conference and another within three to six months. These commitments ranged from the mundane to the very ambitious. Dave Lazarus of the Satterberg Foundation shared an effective short-term strategy: He committed to summarizing the lessons learned in the workshop and to posting them on his family’s website so that other family members could share in his experience.

It is likely that this was the most interactive workshop of the entire conference. The workshop’s success was evident when over one-half the participants elected to continue their discussions more than 10 minutes after its formal conclusion.

Sam Davis is the principal at The Davis Group.

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