Family Firms in the Developing Context: Essays on Internationalization, Women, and Generational Changes

Abstract

Despite a plethora of research discussing the effect of context on internationalization of firms, the family business literature has only recently begun to acknowledge contextual characteristics as important factors shaping family firm behavior (i.e. Carney, Duran, Van Essen, and Shapiro, 2017). The first essay, a literature review, adds to this conversation by unpacking how internationalization decisions in developing country family firms are affected by a number of resources, industry and institutional characteristics. This systematic review of family firm internationalization uses the strategy tripod perspective to understand characteristics that might have either a negative or a positive valence with respect to internationalization decisions. The second essay, a quantitative study, focuses on the effect of the participation of new generations in the family firms’ top management on internationalization. Results reveal different combinations of socioemotional wealth prioritization and influence over decision making that result in increased internationalization efforts. Finally, the third essay is a qualitative study that focuses on an understudied topic in the family business domain: women. Specifically, this essay studies the succession process of women into to family firm’s top management. Using a institutional logics perspective this study shows different mechanisms that helped women manage the barriers created by predominant logics, in their pathway to succession.