Catherine advises families and family offices around family office establishment, family governance, and philanthropy. She believes that when families understand their values and the purpose of their wealth, they can build on much stronger foundations and, by aligning their structures and activities with this, create sustainable long-term solutions. She has a unique perspective from the roles she has held including heading a private office and sitting on the board of three international trust companies after starting her career as a private client lawyer.

How has the role of a private client expert changed most since you began practising?

The environment our clients operate in has become increasingly complex and dynamic. Clients don’t only need technical advisers but ones who can help them to understand the context in which they are operating and enable them to make informed decisions. Good advisers have always played this sort of a role but they need to keep abreast of more areas now than ever, from cyber security to ESG, in a world in which their clients are increasingly judged by the court of public opinion.

What matters are clients coming to you with most over the past year? What is driving this?

I have been having a lot of discussions about the role of the rising generation. When coming from the senior family members it might be around how to successfully engage younger generations of the family in the family enterprise but just as commonly the discussion is initiated by the rising generation wanting to understand how they can get more involved and start to influence the direction of travel themselves. This is being driven by the sheer number of transitions that are starting to take place now within families and the fact that covid-19 has acted as a catalyst for many of these.

How does your background as a lawyer enhance the offering and perspective you bring to clients?

While I no longer practice law, my legal training has helped to understand the different structures that a family may have in place, such as trusts. It has also given me a structured approach to problem solving, and plenty of good contacts to call upon when my clients need legal advice.

Are there any generational differences in the needs of private clients? If so, what are they and what do you think is driving them?

There are a lot of generational differences in the work that I am doing as it depends on the stage of life individuals are at – with older family members thinking more about their legacy and the implications of a particular course of action for the whole family. Younger family members are often looking for information and autonomy to enable them to plan and manage their own lives.

What ESG concerns are most affecting your clients and private client practice more widely?

As younger generations of a family become more involved in the family’s activities, they are very keen to understand how the family enterprise and its activities align with their own personal values. For example if there’s a family business, how does it make money and how does it treat its employees, where there are investments, what are they invested in and how are they structured. This is not about ESG in the narrow sense but about understanding whether they are comfortable with the general approach taken to environmental issues and/or aspects of social responsibility.

What are the key challenges that the next generation of private client experts may face?

The modern client often needs a lot of different experts over the course of time – rarely will any one individual have all the answers. They get the best results where they have a team of advisers who collaborate effectively but this takes practice and clients can also need educating on the benefits as these may not all be apparent at the outset.

What makes BDO stand out from its competitors in the market?

First and foremost, BDO’s culture is driven by the people who work here and they have earned us our good reputation. Secondly, the family governance and family office work that I do is integrated as part of our private wealth offering which means it is available to more of our clients and positively impacts the way in which we approach them and their situations.

As head of family office services at BDO, how are you looking to develop the group over the next few years?

After launching the practice 18 months ago (and at the height of covid-19), we are still building awareness and understanding of the offering and what it is that we can do for clients and that will remain a large focus for the coming year. We have also just reorganised ourselves internally within our private wealth practice so I will be focusing on developing our succession and governance team so that more people are equipped to have these conversations.