A good family meeting with young adult children has a written agenda, a set length and a clear purpose, and the young adults help shape both the agenda and the ground rules. Most families do well with a short meeting every month or quarter plus a longer one once a year. Advisers join for specific topics, by invitation, after the family has talked among itself first.
Why hold family meetings at all
As children become adults, conversations about money, expectations, the family home or a family business tend to happen in fragments: at holidays, in the car, in tense moments. A regular meeting moves those topics to a calm, scheduled place where everyone knows the rules. It also treats young adults as participants with a voice rather than an audience. The format works for any family, with or without a business or significant assets.
Meetings also teach skills young adults need anyway: running an agenda, disagreeing respectfully, making a decision with other people and following through on it. Those carry straight into work and their own future households.
What a family meeting should cover
- Updates from each person: what they are working on, what is going well, what is hard.
- The shared calendar: holidays, trips, moves and big dates in the next few months.
- Agreements: who pays for what, living at home, the car, the phone plan. If an adult child lives at home, an independence agreement gives the meeting something concrete to review.
- One education topic, chosen in advance, such as how the family thinks about giving, work or debt.
- Decisions that affect everyone, such as a property, a family business question or care for a grandparent.
- One thing to celebrate.
Keep one person’s struggles out of the group setting. Those belong in a private conversation.
How often to meet
- Monthly or quarterly, for 45 to 60 minutes, for updates and agreements. Video works well when children live in different cities.
- Once a year, a longer meeting for bigger topics and education.
- An extra meeting only when a real decision needs everyone.
Consistency matters more than frequency. A quarterly meeting that always happens beats a monthly one that keeps getting canceled.
How to keep it from turning into a lecture
- Share the agenda a week ahead and ask each young adult to add at least one item.
- Rotate who runs the meeting. Facilitating, even clumsily, builds skill and ownership.
- Set ground rules together: phones away, one person talks at a time, no surprise topics.
- Parents talk less than half the time and ask questions before giving views.
- End with written action items (who does what by when) and review them at the start of the next meeting.
If one child dreads the meetings, ask privately why. Often the fix is a shorter agenda or less airtime spent on their personal choices.
When advisers should join
Many families work with financial advisers, estate attorneys or family office staff. They can add a lot, but timing matters:
- Hold the first few meetings as a family only, so young adults can ask basic questions without an audience.
- Invite an adviser for a specific topic, such as how a trust works in general, with the agenda shared in advance.
- As young adults get older, let them meet advisers one on one and build their own relationships.
- For hard conversations, some families bring in a neutral facilitator so parents can simply participate.
A mentor is not a financial, legal, tax or estate adviser, and those questions stay with the family’s professionals. Our guide on preparing young adults for inheritance covers the non-financial side of readiness.
Where a mentor helps
Family meetings set expectations; follow-through happens in the weeks between them. A mentor works one on one with a young adult on the goals they agreed to, such as a first job, a budget or moving out, and with their permission shares progress updates with parents, so the next meeting starts from facts rather than worry. See mentoring for families and next generation mentoring.
Related
- Mentoring for families
- Next generation mentoring
- A mentor for your adult child
- For wealth advisors and family offices
- Returning to Work After Parental Leave: A First Month Plan
- What to Do After Retirement: Building Structure and Purpose
Common questions
At what age should children join family meetings?
Many families start in the teen years with lighter topics and add bigger ones in the early 20s. The right age depends on maturity and on what the family is ready to share.
What if my young adult refuses to come?
Ask what would make it worth their time, shorten the meeting and give them a real role. Pressure usually backfires; see when an adult child refuses help.
Should partners of adult children attend?
Families decide differently. Many include partners in general meetings and keep certain topics, such as estate details, to a smaller group on their attorney’s advice.
Can a mentor run our family meetings?
No. A mentor works with the young adult between meetings. A neutral facilitator or the family’s advisers are better suited to running the meeting itself.
Get started
Want support for the follow-through between family meetings? Call (888) 305 5422, email contact@blackburnmentoring.com or start with a short assessment. A member of our team reviews every assessment personally and sets up a free intro call.