Owners’ Assembly
One of the reasons for establishing an Owners’ Assembly is as the forum at which Decisions reserved for the owners will be taken. An Owners’ Assembly can also be created to ensure that there is regular communication and an open dialogue between the owners and the board of an operating company on any number of matters, such as a policy on employing and remunerating family members or long term strategic plans for the business.
Where a family enterprise controls a diversified portfolio of assets in which largely the same family members are interested, the Owners’ Assembly is a valuable structure to govern these overall interests effectively.
Two things are very important; establishing where the Owners’ Assembly fits into the overall governance of a family enterprise and the internal governance of the Assembly itself.
- What powers will the Assembly have and how will its effectiveness in the overall governance of the family enterprise be evaluated?
- How, when and where will Assembly meetings be convened and who has power and responsibility for doing this?
- What is the role of proxies?
- What majorities are needed to approve different types of decisions?
- How will conflicts of interests be managed, for example in relation to an owner’s activities outside the family enterprise?
