Entrepreneurial Orientation In Family Firms Research Articles

Psychological ownership, knowledge sharing and entrepreneurial orientation in family firms: The moderating role of governance heterogeneity

Adopting a stewardship perspective and relying on a sample of 93 Spanish family firms, we emphasize the importance of psychological ownership as a primary determinant of entrepreneurial orientation in terms of proactiveness, innovativeness and risk taking. We also suggest that the relationship between psychological ownership and entrepreneurial orientation is mediated by knowledge sharing. Finally, we assess the potential moderating roles of heterogenous governance conditions in terms of the generation in control, generational involvement and family involvement in the top management team with regard to the relationship between psychological ownership and knowledge sharing. Research and managerial implications are shared in the concluding section.

Sustainable Entrepreneurial Orientation in Family Firms

This study examines how an entrepreneurial orientation moderates the effect of corporate social responsibility (CSR) on family firm performance. Analysis of 174 family firms was conducted using second-generation, partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) in SmartPLS 3.2.6. A survey of family firms and compliant sustainability reports, made under the rules of the GRI (Global Reporting Initiative) for these firms yielded the empirical data. This study contributes to the literature in several ways. First, the analysis shows that GRI reports offer a suitable way for analyzing CSR because the proposed measures are reliable and valid. Second, CSR actions by family firms exert a substantial positive influence on these firms’ performance. Third, entrepreneurial orientation is a good predictor of the success of family firms, positively influencing their performance. Fourth, entrepreneurial orientation positively moderates the effect of CSR on family firm performance, enhancing this effect.

The relationship between organizational culture and entrepreneurial orientation in family firms: Does generational involvement matter?

In family firms, organizational culture evolves through an ongoing dynamic process of intergenerational interaction. Previous research has examined the nexus between family organizational culture and entrepreneurial orientation (EO), but has ignored the moderating role that generational involvement could play on this relationship. To address this limitation in the literature and explore the existence of its potential role, this study draws from the Competing Values Framework to examine the extent to which generational involvement shapes the effects of clan culture and hierarchical culture on EO. From a quantitative study of 106 family SMEs, the results show that there is no single cultural path for developing and maintaining long-term family firm’s entrepreneurial orientation. While clan culture fosters higher levels of EO when only one generation is involved, it is hierarchical culture that fosters higher levels of EO when multiple generations are simultaneously involved. This research pinpoints the importance for family firms that wish to ensure long-term entrepreneurial orientation to introduce changes in their cultural patterns when multiple generations are involved. It also reinforces the notions of formalization and control system in family firms, and their importance for long-term EO. This study calls for further empirical research on the potential role of hierarchical culture in setting up professionalization and family governance mechanisms, and to explore how they affect sustainable entrepreneurial family firm.

Exploring entrepreneurial orientation in family firms: the relevance of social embeddedness in competition

This article investigates the peculiarity of entrepreneurial attitudes in family firms and how they are perceived to impact performance by qualitatively analysing 25 narrative in-depth interviews with family owner-managers in the state of Tyrol, Austria. Contributing to the transmission of the entrepreneurial orientation (EO) construct in family firms, this study adds a thicker description of entrepreneurial attitudes in the family firm context. Findings indicate that aggressive competition contradicts the social embeddedness of family firms and has negative consequences for the family and the firm. The interviewees emphasise non-financial performance goals as drivers of their EO, their social responsibility as a family firm, the embeddedness in regional communities and the importance to be respected by the society.

Exploring entrepreneurial orientation in family firms: the relevance of social embeddedness in competition

This article investigates the peculiarity of entrepreneurial attitudes in family firms and how they are perceived to impact performance by qualitatively analysing 25 narrative in-depth interviews with family owner-managers in the state of Tyrol, Austria. Contributing to the transmission of the entrepreneurial orientation (EO) construct in family firms, this study adds a thicker description of entrepreneurial attitudes in the family firm context. Findings indicate that aggressive competition contradicts the social embeddedness of family firms and has negative consequences for the family and the firm. The interviewees emphasise non-financial performance goals as drivers of their EO, their social responsibility as a family firm, the embeddedness in regional communities and the importance to be respected by the society.

The Genesis of Transformational Environment and Entrepreneurial Orientation in Family Firms

We research a firm’s entrepreneurial orientation as a function of its ownership structure-i.e., whether the organization is owned and controlled by a family. We claim that this relationship occurs ...

Entrepreneurial orientation in family firms: the case of the hospitality industry

Research increasingly shows interest in the motives and characteristics of entrepreneurs in the tourism and hospitality industry. Small and medium-sized family firms dominate this industry. Learning from the concept of entrepreneurial orientation and family business research, this explorative study aims at analysing entrepreneurial behaviours and their effect on performance as perceived by owner-managers of hospitality family businesses. The authors conduct narrative in-depth interviews to understand the managers' meaning of entrepreneurship and performance, and discuss the results in the light of existing entrepreneurship literature. Results indicate that family firms in hospitality and tourism are peculiar, and their embeddedness in the destinations and regions outlines their entrepreneurial behaviour against Schumpeter's definition of growth-oriented entrepreneurship.

Socioemotional Wealth View of Entrepreneurial Orientation in Family Firms

We research how the family ownership increases the entrepreneurial orientation in companies through transformational leadership. We claim is that this is because the family firms’ mission to pursue...

Entrepreneurial orientation in family firms – management and intercultural development

Abstract This paper has taken an insight to the systemic models of family business from the open systems perspective. I focus on family business system models and on the subsystems content of family system and ownership system in family business context. The paper claim that the open system perspective on intercultural family businesses has both theoretical and empirical implications on family business research. Family businesses have many reasons, including family conflicts over money, nepotism leading to wrong management, and infighting over the succession of power from one generation to the other. Regulating the family’s roles as shareholders, board members, and managers is very important because it can help avoid these pitfalls. This paper will discuss the importance of the openness of the company through five the attributes of enduring family businesses: ownership, family, business and portfolio governance, wealth management, foundation. Dimension of attributes success have taken family business like five jewelers.

Entrepreneurial orientation in family firms: the moderating role of technological intensity and performance

This paper examines how socio-emotional factors can influence family firms’ commitment to entrepreneurially- oriented activities, and how their level of commitment is moderated by the technological intensity of the sector and firm performance. We find that, while family firms are less entrepreneurially-oriented than non-family firms, this gap closes with increasing technological intensity of the sector. We find no evidence, however, to suggest any change in entrepreneurial orientation in family firms resulting from a drop in firm performance.

Internationalisation of Family Business: The Effect of Ownership and Generation Involvement

Family enterprises internationalise their businesses after consolidating their influence within their domestic market because once family businesses built up resources and capabilities for growth in domestic market, they are able to leverage it later for further expansion abroad. The paper seeks to examine factors that explain internationalisation of family businesses and their relationship between ownership and governance of the business enterprise. Research shows businesses have been interested in understanding the influence of internationalisation on firm performance; nevertheless, internationalisation diversification offer both advantages and problems. However, the study applies key constructs within the entrepreneurship field and entrepreneurial orientation in family firms.

Entrepreneurial orientation of family firms: Family and environmental dimensions

This work analyzes the influence of three characteristics of family firms (generational level, non-family involvement in management and the next generation's involvement in the business) on their entrepreneurial orientation and the role of environmental dynamism and hostility as moderator variables in that relationship. The empirical investigation is based on a sample of 317 family firms in Andalucía (Spain). The results show that environmental dynamism has a significant moderating impact on the relationship between the next generation's involvement and entrepreneurial orientation. Environmental hostility also exerts a positive influence on risk-taking but a negative one on proactiveness.

Entrepreneurial orientation in family firms: a generational perspective

We adopt a generational perspective to investigate entrepreneurial orientation (EO) in family firms. We test a model that determines how the influence on EO of external factors and internal factors differs in first-, second- and third-and-beyond-generation family firms. We argue that while the founder is vital in the first generation, EO is more subject to interpretations of the competitive environment in the second generation and that in the third generation and beyond, access to non-family resources drives EO to a greater extent. Our findings show that perceptions of the competitive environment and EO correlate differently in family firms, depending on the generation in charge, and it is generally stronger in second-generation family firms. Further, we find that non-family managers on the top management team makes a positive difference for EO only in the third-generation and beyond family firms. The significance of non-family investors’ on EO is particularly strong in third-generation-and-beyond firms.

Family Firms and Entrepreneurial Orientation in Publicly Traded Firms

There is considerable disagreement about whether family firm characteristics hinder or support entrepreneurial activities. This article highlights the existence of an entrepreneurial orientation in family firms, and it examines differences between family and nonfamily firms on the entrepreneurial orientation dimensions of autonomy, competitive aggressiveness, innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk taking, using content analysis of shareholder letters from S&P 500 firms. As such, family firms exhibit language consistent with an entrepreneurial orientation for all dimensions but use less language than that of nonfamily firms in relation to autonomy, proactiveness, and risk taking.

Entrepreneurial Orientation in Family Firms

This paper addresses the connection between corporate entrepreneurship and family businesses, with a particular focus on the construct of entrepreneurial orientation (EO). The main argument is that family firms represent organizational contexts that have specific characteristics with impact on EO. The article includes a review of key literature on EO that is used to define and discuss the family firm as context for entrepreneurial activities. Key themes emerging in the literature review are the roles of culture, dualities and resources as well as the importance of distinguishing between different types of family firms. It is also argued that it is relevant to look further into how “enterprising families” that strive for trans-generational wealth creation attempt to develop and nurture a “family entrepreneurial orientation” (FEO), a construct that addresses the entrepreneurial orientation of a family unit rather than that of a business unit. The article closes with a future research agenda.

Entrepreneurial Orientation, Risk Taking, and Performance in Family Firms

This article focuses on risk taking as one important dimension of entrepreneurial orientation and its impact in family firms. Drawing on a sample of Swedish SMEs, we find that risk taking is a distinct dimension of entrepreneurial orientation in family firms and that it is positively associated with proactiveness and innovation. We also find that even if family firms do take risks while engaged in entrepreneurial activities, they take risk to a lesser extent than nonfamily firms. Moreover, and most importantly for our understanding of entrepreneurial orientation in family firms, we find that risk taking in family firms is negatively related to performance. Both theoretical and practical implications of our findings are provided.