How Thomasina H. Williams Is Helping Families Build and Navigate Generational Wealth

Thomasina H. Williams, Founder and Principal Consultant at Sankofa Legacy Advisors, Inc., is partnering with business-owning families to catalyze more connected and capable individuals across generations. 

After learning there was an emerging industry dedicated to supporting families who were in business together, Thomasina left her successful law career to pivot into this new field. Having personal experience with trying to create generational wealth, it was a subject near and dear to Thomasina's heart. Though her family was unsuccessful in generating that stability—as 70 percent of families lose their wealth by the end of the third generation—Thomasina now supports and empowers business-owning families in building stronger relationships to ensure better decisions are made, families flourish, and financial wealth can survive across many generations.  

We asked Thomasina how her upbringing has shaped how she operates as an entrepreneur, her biggest accomplishments throughout her journey, and why she believes leadership is about managing yourself first. 

Q: Tell us the story behind your company's founding. How and why did you start working on Sankofa Legacy Advisors, Inc.?

A: When I learned that there is an emerging field of professionals who help families navigate the complexities of combining family and finances, I switched careers and went all in to figure out how to help my own family course correct, and how to be a valuable resource for other families. We aim to focus on the people and their relationships, while others focus on their property. Our priority is the people who are the owners and beneficiaries of family financial resources. We leave it to other professionals to manage the resources. 

Our superpower is helping families reimagine what’s possible and walking alongside them as a strategic thought partner, facilitator, coach, and guide to explore the possibilities. As a result, they’re able to see themselves and their situation differently, be more deliberate than reactive when difficulties arise, talk with each other about sensitive subjects, and make tough decisions while preserving and strengthening their relationships. We take a human systems approach to our work, which helps families appreciate that every person exists within a context that connects them to others and gives meaning to their circumstances.  

Picture one of the stock images of networks that we see everywhere these days. There are always lines connecting the people. This is because what one person does impacts others. Families are connected in the same way. It’s just that their connections are invisible. Families automatically react to and influence each other’s behavior without realizing it. We help them see what’s happening, recognize predictable patterns, and work with them to disrupt patterns that are not serving them well.

By taking a systems approach, we view our client as the family enterprise ecosystem, not any one individual or group of individuals. Regardless of who hires us and who pays our fee, we are a neutral third-party helping families to see each other’s perspectives, tap into their innate wisdom, and explore possibilities they couldn’t see or weren’t equipped to pursue on their own.

Q: What problem does Sankofa Legacy Advisors, Inc. solve?

A: Conventional wisdom says that the way to sustain generational wealth is to maximize financial assets and leverage estate planning. Yet families’ most precious assets are not quantifiable. In addition to their operating businesses, family offices, family foundations, real estate, and other financial investments, families want to preserve their relationships and the history, traditions, and values that define and shape who they are. These intangible assets are priceless. They’re also areas where families need help that they don’t generally get from the advisors who manage their financial assets. Moreover, research shows that when families are not attentive to what I refer to as “the family side” of family wealth and family business, they risk both losing their financial wealth and fracturing their family relationships. 

Q: In what ways has your upbringing or past experiences contributed to how you operate as an entrepreneur?

A: My maternal grandmother, Gussie Bellamy, bought real estate in her own name in 1943—quite a feat for a woman of any race in 1943, and especially for a Black woman, in the segregated South, who had little formal education. My grandfather, Wes Bellamy, could not read, and he could not write. Yet they were a formidable pair, with innate entrepreneurial skills. They were citrus growers who owned other businesses and accumulated real estate holdings. 

Today, the entire neighborhood where I grew up bears my grandparents’ name— “Bellamy Heights Park.” They would be proud to know that local government officials voluntarily chose to honor them and their impact on our community in this way. They would also be devastated to know that the only thing that remains of the financial wealth that they worked so hard to create is the six acres that was once their homestead. And it’s vacant, non-income producing land. My grandparents assumed, like many wealth creators, that their wealth would sustain their family for generations well beyond mine. Unfortunately, that didn’t prove to be the case.

It was decades after my grandparents’ deaths that I learned about the “shirtsleeves-to- shirtsleeves-in-three-generations” phenomena by which 70 percent of families lose their wealth by the end of the third generation. Although the original research that gave rise to the 70 percent loss rate has been widely criticized, another study where the researchers interviewed 3,250 families who had undergone generational wealth transitions found the same 70 percent failure rate. 

The latter study looked at the reasons that families are challenged to sustain their wealth across extended generations, despite the best financial and legal advice that money can buy. The research shows that the biggest challenges for families are navigating their relationships—relationships individual family members have with themselves, with each other, and with money, which remains a taboo topic. As families grow in numbers and are increasingly more geographically dispersed, and culturally, socially, and politically diverse, it requires greater intentionality and effort to keep them together and aligned on how to manage their shared assets. 

In my family’s case, the number of joint decision-makers increased from just my grandparents to their ten direct heirs with a wide age span and varying levels of education and sophistication, as well as other differences. I’ve experienced first-hand how the intertwining of family and finances magnifies the complexities that most families are ill-equipped to navigate on their own. As a consequence, financial assets were lost, and family relationships were fractured. It’s why family leadership development and helping families cultivate their individual and collective capabilities has become both my personal passion and professional mission.

Q: We dare you to brag: What achievements are you most proud of?

A: I’ve been fortunate over the course of my three careers to have had several significant milestones. I have also received a number of personal accolades, starting with my time practicing law for nearly 20 years. I had a prestigious clerkship with a federal appellate judge. I then went on to become a partner in what at the time was one of the largest full-service law firms in Florida in three years. After another four years, I left the large law firm and co-founded the first Black-owned law firm in Miami with a primarily corporate clientele. It was written up in the Business section of the Miami Herald. 

I’m honored to have been recognized in those days by the South Florida Legal Journal as one of the “Top 250 Lawyers in South Florida,” the only Black attorney, and one of only 14 women attorneys to be so acknowledged. The Miami-Dade County Commission named a day in my honor to recognize my pro bono legal work before the Florida Supreme Court in a case of statewide significance, and one of the local bar associations gave me a “Living Legend Award” for pivotal work I’ve done in the community. 

As it relates to my current career, I’m honored to have been the first “Family Dynamics Consultant” that Wells Fargo Private Bank hired to come in-house and play a leadership role in building a new line of business to help its ultra-high net worth clients navigate family relationships, generational wealth, and business transitions.

What I’m most proud of though is the positive, transformative impact I’ve made in the lives of other people in all three of my careers. In my work with families, that impact includes a client saying repeatedly what a “gift” it was for her and her family to have worked with me. 

Q: Have you discovered any underappreciated leadership traits or misconceptions around leadership?

A: I think the biggest misconception about leadership is that it’s primarily about other people. The term “leadership” is most often used in reference to leading others. In my view, the most important person to lead is yourself. Leading yourself includes being able to manage yourself in stressful situations and be deliberate, rather than reactive. It means being able to see the big picture and your role in each situation, to appreciate the significance of context and to identify patterns. 

Leading yourself means mustering the courage to take a stand, to say what needs to be said and do what needs to be done, to have difficult conversations and make tough decisions. Whether you’re dealing with your family, your work team, or a professional organization, the better you’re able to manage yourself, the more effective you can be in leading others.

Q: What have you learned about building a team and a support network around yourself?

A: Decades ago, the federal appellate judge with whom I clerked as an aspiring lawyer told me to always hire people who are smarter than I am. I’ve tried to follow his advice and hire people who are smarter than I am in certain aspects of my business, and then empower them to do their thing. In addition to a skilled team, it’s important to have people to turn to who can help me think more clearly, more deeply, and bigger. None of us can do what we do and excel on our own. We all need both an internal team and an external network to support us, challenge us, walk alongside us, encourage us, and push us when we need it.

Q: What would you tell your younger self if you were to start your entrepreneurial journey all over again?  

A: I would tell my younger self to trust myself more. I do, in fact, know enough, know more than I realize, and, often, know more than others in my area of expertise. At the same time, I’m not supposed to have all the answers. If I ever get to a point where I think I know it all, I’m more likely in trouble.

Q: What’s next for you and Sankofa Legacy Advisors, Inc.?

A: I’m most excited about two things that we’re working on. We’re building a growing network of consultants who have deep expertise in a range of areas to better serve families and their advisors. Our team has expertise that includes social impact investing and philanthropy; corporate strategy, finance, and innovation; family business operations and transitions; family systems and learning; health care and well-being, as well as individual and group coaching, leadership development, and team building.  

We’re also piloting a leadership development program for women in business-owning families and families of wealth called “The FEW: Family Enterprise Women™.” It’s an online training, group coaching, and community experience designed to support women in pursuing their personal purpose and passions, while also simplifying and navigating the complexities of combining family and finances. 

Thomasina is a member of Dreamers & Doers, a private collective that amplifies the entrepreneurial pursuits of extraordinary women through thought leadership opportunities, authentic connection, and access. Learn more about Dreamers & Doers and subscribe to their monthly The Digest for top entrepreneurial and career resources.

The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.

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