Leslie C. Voth is the former CEO and current chairman of the Board at Pitcairn, a 100-year-old multi-family office with $7 billion in assets under management. As the board’s first chairman not part of the Pitcairn family, Voth believes that a prosperous family office must focus on families as people, not just portfolios. It is this guiding principle, coupled with her immense industry experience, invaluable insights and fearless leadership skills, that has contributed to the long-term growth of the firm and its families.
Russ Alan Prince: Pitcairn is celebrating 100 years of operating as a family office. How did you facilitate growth after the firm transitioned from a single-family office to a multi-family office?
Leslie C. Voth: Pitcairn has survived and thrived for a century because we evolved as the needs of our clients became more complex. Standing still was never an option because the families we serve are constantly changing.
When I became CEO, the Pitcairn family told me, “The client experience is your north star. If that goes well, everything else will take care of itself.” It was not quite that simple, but that has been my operating principle, and the results speak for themselves.
The most important change we made that enabled us to grow was creating a 100% open architecture platform, which allowed us to act as a fiduciary advisor as well as an investment manager.
As far back as 2000, we started building what we called our Century Plan for how we would approach the challenges of our second hundred years. We looked at where we were and where we wanted to go and then focused on our human capital by recruiting talent and developing leadership within. That plan really created more of a purpose for us as a multi-family office. It was a growth-oriented vision that put Pitcairn on a new playing field.
Prince: What can other family office leaders learn from Pitcairn regarding longevity and creating a lasting business legacy?
Voth: For a business to stand the test of time, it can’t stand still. Pitcairn has grown and prospered because we embraced the entrepreneurial spirit that allowed so many of our clients to build their family fortunes. That attitude has positioned us to continue our growth trajectory into our second hundred years.
And because Pitcairn began serving the needs of just one family, we learned early on that running a successful family office is about a lot more than just managing money. Our clients expect us to be trusted advisors who sit on the same side of the table and provide advice on every aspect of their lives, including the non-financial side.
Without that trust and confidence from the families we work with, Pitcairn could never have lasted so long. To deepen that trust and to help our clients navigate the intricacies of multigenerational wealth, in 2017, we launched Wealth Momentum, an experience-based family office service model focusing on the positive interplay of both family and financial dynamics to allow families to successfully pass on their wealth to the next generation. We further built on that by making a commitment to cultivate and foster lifelong family learning among our client families. We did this by using proprietary research, innovative learning opportunities and peer networking designed to help our client families honor their legacies and prepare the rising generation to be successful wealth owners.
Prince: You were the first female CEO at Pitcairn and have prioritized diversity within the firm during your tenure. Why is diversity so important and how can other family offices follow suit?
Voth: Diversity is important because our client families are diverse, and we should reflect that. When I joined Pitcairn, a conservative patriarchal culture permeated the wealth management industry, but I was determined to see that women’s voices were heard, both within client families and within Pitcairn itself.
Today, as more women have gotten seats at the table, gender has become less important than knowledge, ability and dedication, and that has made the industry more diverse. At Pitcairn, currently, 49% of employees are women, which is a perfect example of why it is important for women to be at the table in the first place, both as wealth management professionals and as family members and leaders.
Throughout my career, I have made it a point to mentor and advance other women within the organization, and one of the things I am most proud of is the culture we have built here at Pitcairn. A lot of firms talk about diversity, but we actually put it into practice and have diversity by generation, by gender and by discipline. It is a culture where we care about each other and our clients.
Prince: Can you share a lesson you learned as a female leader breaking through a male-dominated industry?
Voth: If you want to have an impact, you cannot do it alone. We hear a lot about disruptors as agents of change, but that was not my goal. Instead, I strove to be an artist of change by building consensus for whatever actions I was proposing. My natural instinct has always been to lead with my heart, but that “soft stuff” doesn’t always go over well in the boardroom. I was also fortunate to have the support of the Pitcairn family and its board of directors.
I saw that by co-leading in partnership with male allies and mentors, I would be best positioned to help evolve Pitcairn’s people and culture. So, I worked to forge relationships with colleagues and external thought leaders.
When I was named Pitcairn’s CEO in 2012, I found myself confronting a new set of challenges. There was some resistance to the idea of a woman leader with a more holistic perspective. That was where my collaborative years of painstaking relationship-building paid off. Slowly but surely, colleagues came to trust that I was still the same person with whom they had collaborated for years.
Russ Alan Prince is the executive director of Private Wealth and a strategist for family offices and the ultra-wealthy. He has co-authored 70 books in the field, including Making Smart Decisions: How Ultra-Wealthy Families Get Superior Wealth Planning Results.
