The MDT, DefinedThe MDT, Defined

John P.C. Duncan and Anita M. Sarafa

The model for a managing directed trustee (MDT) comes from organizations like family offices and private trust companies (PTCs) that evolved, in part, to support and coordinate a family's trustees and other financial services providers.

Family offices coordinate trustees and other participants in multi-participant trusts. Ideally, formal fiduciary support agreements are in place in which the family office agrees that, at the right times, it will provide participants the information they need to make the decisions for which they are responsible. The family office also records the decisions and implements them.

A PTC performs the same functions — but does so by bringing the participants into its committee ...