Making a Difference: A Literature Review of Management Practices in Owner-Managed Companies

Abstract

This paper provides an in-depth analysis of research on management practices in owner-managed companies. The systematic review of 116 articles from 30 years (1990-2020) reveals three key themes: (1) effects attributable to historical, developing, and idiosyncratic factors on industry, company, owner-manager, and management practice level shape the practice configuration in a given owner-managed company, (2) owner-managed companies are not badly managed, the management practices implemented are only more informal, shaped by resource-constraints and highly dependent on the owner-manager, (3) many differences between studies on performance implications of variables can be explained by differences in variable operationalization. This paper’s central contributions are the provision of an overview on 30 years of management practice research, an elaboration on a cumulative capabilities model for management practices, and the proposal of an integrating perspective on practices – the teleological practice perspective.