The Board of Directors in Family Firms: One Size Fits All?

Abstract

Boards of directors are governance bodies that serve important functions for organizations, ranging from monitoring management on behalf of different shareholders to providing resources. Board roles and characteristics vary widely among national cultures and, within each country, among different company types. Despite such variety, research on family business boards has been dominated by prescriptions and by the lack of an explicit recognition of family firm types characterized by different governance requirements. We argue that a contingency approach to defining board structure, activity, and roles offers useful guidance in understanding board contributions to family business performance. We develop a theory to show how board characteristics are a reflection of a family firm's power, experience, and culture makeup. This theory provides insight into descriptions of existing board choices and prescriptions for family firms interested in starting or adapting their board of directors.