Business Successors Research Articles

The Unseen Part of Successions: Exploring the Mental Well-Being of Family Business Successors

The Unseen Part of Successions: Exploring the Mental Well-Being of Family Business Successors

Thematic analysis of the experiences and perceptions of family business successors prior to their mantle of leadership in Nigeria

The experiences and perceptions of family business successors prior to their choice as the successors of their family business were explored to determine the qualities that attracted their choice as family business successors and how these qualities impacted their success since they assumed the mantle of leadership. Fifteen successful family businesses with successors controlling the businesses were purposively selected to suit the research goals. The selection was done through snowball sampling, while convenience sampling was used to select participants for face-to-face interviews. Each interview averaged 15 minutes. Thematic interpretive text analysis was performed on the data, and interviews were transcribed verbatim. Data were coded into categories, namely prior experience, training of the successor, education of the successor, passion, and commitment of the successor. Findings revealed that commitment without passion for the business might not be sustainable due to potential business challenges that could undermine commitment and focus. However, strong passion for the business could foster determination to succeed despite challenges. The family believed that education would guide the successor, providing exposure, confidence, and opportunities to bolster the family business image globally. Prior experience gave family business successors the confidence to settle down easily and meet family and community expectations, addressing challenges faster while maintaining business culture and capabilities. Community and family norms perceived education as essential in choosing a successor. Passion was a key success factor in choosing successors, and successors' passion grew upon realizing their formidable role in the family business.

I want to break free: Successor Emancipation in Family Business

Family business successors live at the nexus of past, present and future, nourished and inspired by past legacies while also craving to build a brand-new future. The senior generation is generally the guardian of firm continuity in charge of preserving past achievements, whereas the next generation might dream about introducing change and innovation within the current landscape of the family firm. Yet these attempts too often trigger resistance and anxiety in the senior generation, who might respond with increasing control and suspicion to any tentative of challenging the status quo such as transforming current products, services, business models, or organizational structures. Successors operate at the intersection of these opposite forces of conservatism and reform, and one of their major issues is that they need to handle them effectively, that is without jeopardizing family relations and harmony nor losing themselves into the process. Unless they succeed in doing so, succession failure might follow. By combining two different streams of literature grounded in distinct disciplines, namely succession literature in family business and emancipation literature in entrepreneurship, we reveal successor emancipation as a novel explanation of why successions fail and offer some practical advice on how to handle these tensions in intra-family succession.
 Received: 10 May 2023 Accepted: 28 Jun 2023

The Effect of Successor Readiness on Family Business Sustainability

Leadership succession in a family business is the process of transferring leadership from predecessor to business successor, this process involves preparing a successor who will take over leadership and be responsible for the family business. Ineffective succession planning will not be able to make a successor in accordance with company goals that will cause the company to fall. This study aims to determine the effect of successor readiness on the sustainability of family business. With the object of research of students of the Indonesian University of Education, Tasikmalaya Campus. This study used quantitative methods, with a descriptive approach and journal analysis related to sustainability factors in family businesses. Based on the results of the study, there are allegations that successor readiness has a positive effect on the sustainability of family businesses and provides useful insights on how families can improve family business sustainability through successor readiness.

The Influence of Bequest Motives in Selecting Chinese-Owned Family Business Successor in Malaysia

The Influence of Bequest Motives in Selecting Chinese-Owned Family Business Successor in Malaysia

An Entrepreneurship-as-practice perspective of next-generation becoming family businesses successors: the role of discursive artefacts

ABSTRACT Family is the most important, yet under researched, dimension in family business research. Following recent calls in Entrepreneurship-as-Practice, we bring a practice-based approach to family business research to understand next generation engagement over extended periods in family life. Drawing on a culinary family business’s three published cookbooks, theorized as ‘discursive artefacts’, we examine how mundane family business practices can enable next generations to become successors. This study contributes to family business research with its re-focus on the family and offers new insights into practice theory-building in the emergent Entrepreneurship-as-Practice. Our findings illustrate how everyday practices in family lives – for example, cooking – can enable next generations’ becoming family business successors, through socializing, bridging, and leading.

Generation AI and family business: a perspective article

PurposeThis perspective article responds to the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) as a significant opportunity for growth among family businesses, highlighting the need for future research to attain a clear picture of the next generation of family business successors.Design/methodology/approachThis is a literature review of current technology adoption within family businesses. The authors offer some research insight to spur critical thinking and discourse around the impact of AI on family business successors.FindingsFamily businesses are initially skeptical of AI technology. However, its use and adoption are crucial for the survival of the family business. To leverage this technology, the authors need to investigate the role of the family business successors as “Gen AI.”Originality/valueIt is challenging but necessary to develop policies and educational support for successors to ensure the survival of family businesses worldwide. The authors propose four key areas of future research.

The Determinants of a Successful Family Business Succession

Majority of business in Indonesia is family business firm. In fact, according to Daya Qarsa Research Firm in 2022, family businesses have contributed about 80% to Indonesia’s GDP as well as 40% to Indonesia’s market capitalization. However, most of the family businesses start to falter during the second generation and doesn’t last until the third generation. This article aims to determine 1) the influence of succession planning on family business succession, 2) the influence of family relationship on family business succession, 3) the influence of entrepreneurial spirit on family business succession, 4) the influence of intergeneration managerial mindset on family business succession. The method used to collect data in this study is online question form with google-form questionnaire with a total sample of 37 respondents. The data analysis technique used is Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) with SmartPLS as the data processing tool. The samples in this study are family business successors in Gorontalo. The result of this study is 1) succession planning has an influence on family business succession, 2) family relationship has an influence on family business succession, 3) entrepreneurial spirit has an influence on family business succession, 4) intergeneration managerial mindset has no influence on family business succession.

Through her eyes: How daughter successors perceive their fathers in shaping their entrepreneurial identity

This study investigates how daughter successors perceive that their entrepreneurial identities have been influenced by their fathers. Drawing on narrative identity and identity work theories and adopting an inductive and interpretive approach, we analysed interviews with 21 daughters. The findings reveal that their perceptions of their fathers can influence their entrepreneurial identities in multiple ways, concerning both why daughters become family business successors and how their entrepreneurial identities are shaped. To examine this variety of experiences, this study proposes a typology of four processes through which daughters’ entrepreneurial identities were formed (submission, self-empowerment, enhancement, and idealisation) and how they perceive their fathers’ role (commander, patriarch, mentor, and myth) in influencing these processes. This study contributes to the family business and entrepreneurial identity fields of research by showing that daughters’ perceptions of the role they ascribe to their fathers can be powerful mental representations that exert a great influence on their entrepreneurial identity.

Of Succession Stories and Scenarios: The Challenges and Options Facing First-Generation Family-Owned Restaurants

First-generation business owners are concerned with sustaining the business, not how they got started or built their brand. First-generation business owners are considering passing the torch to second- generation to sustain business leadership and brand legacy. This study helps restaurant owners develop a succession plan. The research study determined the perceived challenges in succession planning for first generation family run restaurant owners and correspondingly created an appropriate succession plan. The research focused on first generation restaurant owners’ succession planning challenges. Qualitative research was used to arrive at the conclusion of the study. Interpretivism was the philosophical lens through which this was viewed. Participants in this study were first-generation owners of family run restaurants in Cavite Province that had existed for more than seven years. Data were gathered using interview guide. Themes and their meanings were discovered through thematic analysis. Lack of Know-How among Would-Be Successors in Restaurant Management, Lack of Passion in Restaurant Management among Would-Be Successors and Lack of Second Generation Business Successor are the three Challenges to Business Succession faced by business owners. Four business founders’ attributes to success have emerged as building blocks in creating appropriate succession plan for Family-Owned Restaurants: (a) Resilience and Tenacity, (b) Resourcefulness, (c) Customer-Centric, and (d) Founders’ Interventions. In succession planning, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. An effective succession plan can accommodate the needs of a particular business owner. In this sense, first-generation business owners’ unwavering commitment to succession planning is important.

Advice for Family Business Successors: Be Humble and Curious

Advice for Family Business Successors: Be Humble and Curious

The influence of successor's implicit power and explicit power on dual innovation---The mediating effect of board dissent.

This study explores the influence of the power of family business successors on firm innovation under the theory of social embeddedness. Based on the 2000-2019 unbalanced panel data of listed Chinese family enterprises, this study empirically examines the differences in the influence of the implicit and explicit power of successors on incremental and radical innovation respectively. Our findings show that explicit power has a more positive impact on incremental innovation, while implicit power is more conducive to promoting radical innovation. In addition, the study finds that the reason why the explicit power of succession does not have a significant impact on radical innovation, that is, the reason why board dissent is not related to radical innovation, is that some of the major innovation decisions in the enterprise are not all made at formal meetings. The research conclusions not only extend the theoretical application of social embeddedness in family enterprises, but also provide certain practical guidance for promoting enterprise innovation.

EVALUATION OF FAMILY BUSINESS SUCCESSOR CRITERIA: CV. SENTRA MOTOR SPORT

The family business has a characteristic in which the transfer of leadership is given to one of the family members as the next generation to maintain the continuity of its enterprise. Most family businesses in Indonesia do not yet have its succession plan. One of the keys to a successful selection of prospective business successors is to determine the right leadership criteria. This research aims to (1) identify indicators of successor characteristics, (2) identify leadership criteria, and (3) compose an evaluation of the succession at CV. Sentra Motor Sport (CV.SMS), a family business in the automotive sector located in Bogor, Indonesia. The tools for this research are successor’s characteristics indicator, ACE MAN leadership criteria, and post-succession evaluation. The study employed descriptive-qualitative methods from primary data obtained through in-depth interviews with the predecessor, successor, and the employees of the family business. The total number of respondents were five persons. The interviews were conducted from June to July 2020. The results showed that the indicators of successor characteristics were in accordance with the expectations of the founder. The results of the ACE MAN leadership criteria assessment showed that the most dominant criterion was networking and the smallest ones were charismatic and achieving. According to the post-succession evaluation, the successor’s leadership criteria of CV. Sentra Motor Sport could be categorized as a successful case.

Influence of Successors’ Entrepreneurial Competencies on Performance in Family-Owned Small and Medium Enterprises in Arusha City, Tanzania

This paper examines attributes of successors’ entrepreneurial competencies such as risk-taking propensity, ability to exploit business opportunities, innovation and commitment in family businesses in Arusha City, Tanzania. A cross-sectional research design was employed using a quantitative survey approach, in which two hundred family business successors provided data for this paper. The data were analysed using the Hierarchical Regression Model to assess the influence of successors’ entrepreneurial competencies on the performance of family-owned SMEs. The findings indicate that successors’ risktaking propensity and the ability to exploit business opportunities influence the performance of family-owned SMEs. The paper concludes that familyowned SMEs managed by successors who can take calculated risks and are also able to exploit business opportunities are in a good position to realize better performance in terms of net profit. It is recommended that family business founders should build their successors’ entrepreneurial competencies.

Cut or Close in? Examining Social Relations from Stakeholders Perspective Towards Family Business Success

Stakeholder social support is integral to the thriving of the succesors in a family business. The paper aims to develop an understanding about the provisions of social nudge that influence the support of stakeholders (viz., life partner, investor, community of entrepreneur, expert, venture partner and employee) towards the role of successor in the family business. Implicit in many discussions of congruence of gender roles and job roles is the idea of perceived incongruity between the female gender role and leadership roles. We address whether this intuition is supported by the empirical data in the context of 218 family businesses i.e., 1,308 stakeholders. The role is understood in terms of the gender role congruity of the successor, in simple words, the effect of the gender of the successor in shaping the social support from stakeholders. Network Relationship Inventory-Social Provisions Version (NRI-SPV) (Furman & Buhrmester, 1985) is used to conceptualize social provisions and thus, is used to measure stakeholders’ social nudge. The results imply that social nudge comprises of antagonism as negative quality and affection, nurturance and reassurance of worth as positive quality. The positive and negative social nudge by the stakeholders along with the gender effect determines the support of stakeholders towards the family business successor. Moderation analysis further reveals that gender influences the stakeholders’ positive and negative qualities.

Entrepreneuring as emancipation in family business succession: a story of agony and ecstasy

ABSTRACT Following Alistair Anderson’s legacy of entrepreneuring as a process of becoming, this paper engages with entrepreneuring as emancipation in a family business context. Over a period of seven years, we witnessed the journey of a family business successor engaged in a challenging process of power transfer, ultimately leading him to leave the succession process to engage with entrepreneuring outside the family business, due to power struggles. We theoretically elaborate on this real-time, multi-informant, multi-generational and longitudinal single-case study to offer a novel understanding of entrepreneuring as emancipation from and through power by revealing the intimate connections of entrepreneuring with power, liberation and liberty encompassing as much agony as ecstasy.

Succession Intention in Continuing Family Business in Indonesia during the Covid-19 Pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic disrupted many industries and created a different reality of function in terms of several aspects, including family business and succession. This paper discusses how family business successor intentions regarding succeeding the family business in the near future have been affected by the pandemic. The subjects of our study are senior undergraduate business students that could potentially become successors in their family business. Our model is based on the Intention Model from the Theory of Perceived Behaviors, modified from our previous study with Intention to succeeding family business as the dependent variable. Data of 203 valid respondents was collected through quantitative survey and analyzed using a multiple linear regression model. The results of our study show that, during the pandemic, the intention of the heirs of the family business in succeeding his/her family business will be determined by the successor’s own attitude in succeeding family business, campus education, familiness, and resiliency of family business situation in facing the pandemic.

Family business successors' motivation and innovation capabilities: the case of Kosovo

PurposeThis study aims to investigate the second-generation successors’ motives to join family businesses and their ability to generate innovation within them.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative methodology is used in this study. Data were collected through structured interview with the second-generation representatives, where the data obtained helped us to come to the results and answer the research questions of the study. A total of 15 interviews were conducted.FindingsThe findings of this study show that the second generation is motivated to continue the family business, cases show that successors since childhood have been oriented towards building an entrepreneurial mindset and also after entering the family business have generated innovation.Originality/valueThe study will bring theoretical implications to the family business literature, providing scientific evidence for the second generation of family businesses, from an emerging country such as Kosovo. As Kosovo is an emerging country, the study will contribute to the literature, suggesting other studies by emerging countries in this way to see the similarities and differences.

Management Succession and Entrepreneurship Business Sustenance

Succession planning has drawn substantial interest among researchers. Research reports designate deficiency of quality planning in the management of SMEs especially in developing countries like Nigeria and this constitutes a foremost limitation to the effective management of SMEs. Succession planning are fundamental to steady performance, sustainability and competitive advantage of SMEs. The objective of the study was to investigate the effects of HR planning/forecasting on family business continuity and also to examine the effect of workers education on survival of entrepreneur. 110 copies of questionnaire were administered to the employees in the five selected SMEs in Abeokuta Ogun state, Nigeria to get primary data that treated and tested appropriate research questions and hypotheses accordingly. Analysis of variance (ANOVA), correlation efficient and regression analysis was employed. The Yamane formula was used to determine the sample size. The test re-test reliability approach was adopted for the convenience of the researcher. Reliability was ensued by Cronbachs Alpha of 0.932. The data was analyzed using manual and electronic based methods through the data preparation grid and statistical package for the social sciences, (SPSS). The study found out that HR succession planning significantly assists SMEs to increase business continuity and Workers education significantly assists SMEs to increase business survival. The study recommends that organizational succession planning should be at regular interval as this will enable workers to know its importance and also business successors should be appointed based on merit so that the right and experience successors can manage the business.

Current Status and Factors Affecting Succession Planning of Small-Medium Scale Enterprises in Bono Ahafo Region of Ghana

Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) play an essential role in the national economic development of any country. However, SMEs face one major challenge, which is the lack or inefficiency/ineffectiveness of succession planning. Therefore, this quantitative correlational study sought to investigate the Current status and factors affecting succession planning of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in the BrongAhafo Regions. The study used a quantitative correlational research design to achieve the research purpose. Data were collected from 140 respondents involved in SMEs from nine Municipal and District Assemblies from the BrongAhafo Region of Ghana. The result revealed that most SMEs in the BrongAhafo region (70%) had experienced succession planning, and they have a policy that guides them on succession planning practices. The study’s findings further established that 60% of the management of SMEs in the region has shown commitment to succession planning, and 50% of them involved their staff in succession planning decisions. It was also identified that 60% of SMEs in the BrongAhafo region identified and groomed potential employees for future leadership positions, and 58.7% of the successors were selected based on merits, almost 50% (49.3%) of the owners of the SMEs prefer their family members as business successors. The results also indicated that five (5) component factors were obtained from the twenty variables presented to the respondents.Further analysis reduced the components into three (3), namely, internal, external, and successor’s factors. A reliability test was run on these latent variables. The result showed reliability factors of 0.854, 0.798, and 0.862, respectively, implying that the three variables satisfy the essential requirement of a Cronbach alpha measure more than 0.7 with high internal consistency in the variables.The study recommends that much emphasis should be put on internal organizational improvement through coaching, mentoring, and empowering of employees by the current leadership to improve on the relationship among organizational members. If the internal factors are well managed by management as recommended, it will reduce the adverse effects of external factors that may affect succession planning.