Abstract
The viability and adaptation of family firms is a key research area owing to the longevity and transgenerational vision of the family. Throughout their development, firms transition through strategic change episodes with a potentially significant impact on their performance and survival. In this article, we combine family firm with strategic change research to propose how familiness supports or limits strategic change. We put forward three tendencies of family firms in their ability to deal with strategic change. First, familiness creates an overemphasis on the cognition of gradual change triggers but limits the cognition of radical change triggers. Second, familiness creates a tendency to inappropriately scope and dimension strategic change in radical change episodes to protect the value of legacy resources. Third, familiness supports endurance during strategic change implementation while also creating a tendency to be too slow or stubborn when implementing an insufficient change decision.
Highlights
Firms are the most common type of business firm worldwide (e.g., Faccio and Lang 2002; La Porta et al 1999), often outperforming their peers (e.g., Anderson and Reeb 2003a; Lee 2006; Maury 2006; Martínez et al 2007) and reaching remarkable ages
We develop propositions on how familiness influences the mechanisms along the strategic change process that we further differentiate by the environmental change episode
To summarize the previous section, we conclude that, while familiness affords family firms an edge in gradual change episodes, it can become a liability in radical change episodes, providing a differentiated picture of the positive and negative effects of familiness (Weismeier-Sammer et al 2013)
Summary
Firms are the most common type of business firm worldwide (e.g., Faccio and Lang 2002; La Porta et al 1999), often outperforming their peers (e.g., Anderson and Reeb 2003a; Lee 2006; Maury 2006; Martínez et al 2007) and reaching remarkable ages. Firms are often associated with high failure rates (e.g., Ward 2016; Wilson et al 2013) and stagnation (e.g., Ward 1997) caused by family-internal changes such as generational transition (e.g., Aronoff 2004; Vallejo 2008; Ward 1997) They are increasingly challenged by young, fast-growing technology companies which target traditional industry domains with disruptive technologies and business models. Existing research rarely incorporates a holistic and more complex set of mechanisms along the three outlined steps of the strategic change process that combine cognition, decision, and implementation To fill this conceptual gap, the research question in this article is as follows: What are the supporting and limiting effects of familiness on the strategic change process? Limitations and areas for future research are presented
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
