Toward a Typology of Family Firm Corporate Entrepreneurship

Family involvement in business creates idiosyncrasies in firm behavior that promote long‐term, often transgenerational, strategic logics that ostensibly align with the motivations and outcomes of corporate entrepreneurship. Interestingly, extant research provides only minimal insight into the heterogeneous nature of corporate entrepreneurship orientations pursued by family firms. To better understand this heterogeneity, we develop a typology of corporate entrepreneurship in family firms providing a reconciliatory approach to this literary diversity and suggest that the varied corporate entrepreneurship orientations of family firms are impacted by the duality of a family's distinct intention to pursue transgenerational succession and capabilities to acquire external knowledge.     

Entrepreneurship and Family Firm Research: A Bibliometric Analysis of An Emerging Field

This work carries out a comprehensive and systematic review of academic research on entrepreneurship in family firms applying bibliometric indicators. We review the literature published on these topics on the database ISI Web of Knowledge's Social Sciences Citation Index. The results provided show that it is a relatively recent field of study, highly interconnected with high co‐citation between authors, which verifies compliance with Lotka's Law, and where the most productive authors and journals do not necessarily coincide with those most cited. Finally, the co‐word analysis has identified research topics classified into widely developed issues and specialized peripheral issues.     

Introduction to Institutions,Entrepreneurship and Firm Growth: The Case of Sweden

Small Business Economics -     

Entrepreneurship in the Theory of the Firm

This paper develops micro-economic foundations for a theory of entrepreneurship and growth, focusing on innovation and opportunity as intermediate linkages between the two. Expanding upon points of tangency between Schumpeter and Coase, the paper argues that transactions costs are the glue that holds together entrepreneurial “new combinations.” Technological/organizational complexity of production is defined as the extent to which a technical decision by one unit within the firm affects the productive efficiency of other units. Where decreasing transactions costs tend to pull incumbent organizations apart, the possession of difficult to imitate production practices by the same organizations keeps them together. The dissolution of incumbent firms creates opportunities for entrepreneurs; the prospect of Schumpeterian rents provides the incentive to realize those opportunities.      

Entrepreneurship,Firm Growth and Regional Development in the New Economic Geography: Introduction

Small Business Economics -     

Corporate Entrepreneurship, Informal Ties, and Firm Performance: Evidence from China

How can a firm achieve superior performance through corporate entrepreneurship in a transition economy? To address this question, we draw upon the resource-based view and the institutional theory to explore distinct roles of business ties and political ties in fulfilling resource needs confronted by different corporate entrepreneurial activities (i.e., internal innovation, venturing and strategic renewal). Using data of 228 firms from the Pearl River Delta area in China, our empirical findings reveal that corporate entrepreneurial activities do not always positively lead to performance in transition economies. Furthermore, the possession of high levels of business ties is more beneficial to the success of internal innovation and strategic renewal, while the possession of high levels of political ties contributes more to the success of venturing.     

The Large Family Firm in Twentieth-Century France

This survey of family capitalism in twentieth-century France demonstrates that, by using alternatives to managerial structures, especially the holding company, families were able to reconcile expansion with personalised control, without sacrificing efficiency. This article demonstrates that familial control, most usually associated with the staple industries, also persisted in new industrial sectors and in retailing in the inter-war period and into the post-war era. Since by the inter-war period many of the firms in these sectors were large in terms of employment, levels of integration and capitalisation, it appears that personal capitalism should not always be equated with stagnation and conservatism: This survey also shows that the decline of family ownership and control in large-scale companies was not always the product of the quest for scale economies. Indeed, by highlighting the contrasting economic and sometimes political pressures facing firms in a range of sectors, it demonstrates how difficult it is to provide any general explanation of a loss of familycontrol.     

Introduction to Institutions,Entrepreneurship and Firm Growth: From Sweden to the OECD

Small Business Economics -     

Owner as Manager,Extended Horizons and the Family Firm

Previous work on firm ownership structure suggests that organizations in which ownership and control are combined may be undervalued relative to the market investment rule because decision makers have an incentive to forgo investment projects that managers in firms with specialized ownership find profitable. However, the specialization of ownership and decision-making functions may result in substantial agency costs. This paper shows that these tradeoffs may not exist in family firms. The extended horizons characteristic of family businesses may provide the necessary incentives for decision makers to invest according to the market rule while limiting agency costs that arise when ownership and control are separated. Family ties, loyalty, insurance, and stability are expected to be effective in lengthening the horizons of managers and in providing the incentives for family managers to make efficient investments in the family business.     

The Phenomenon of Substantive Conflict in the Family Firm: A Cross-Generational Study

This study investigates the influence that family members exert on the extent and frequency of substantive conflict within family firms across generations as a result of their familial relationship (distance) with the owner/manager of the firm and the positions these family members occupy in the family work group and social (non-work) group. Following Beckhard and Dyer (1983), the construct of substantive conflict was vested in four key issues pertinent to family firms: (1) ownership continuity or change; (2) executive leadership continuity or change; (3) power and asset distribution; and (4) management's vision for the role of the firm in society. The results establish a relationship between conflict in a family business and the composition of the family's work group, non-work (social) group, and the extensiveness of the family's social interactions. The relationships between conflict and family influence were found to be moderated by the generations (first, second, third, or later) among involved family businesses.     

The Family Firm in Industrial Capitalism: International Perspectives on Hypotheses and History

This comparative analysis of the international literature on family firms takes A.D. Chandler's concept of ‘personal capitalism’, presented in Scale and Scope, as the theoretical frame of reference. The article focuses principally on Britain, particularly the thesis that large family firms were probably major contributors to national economic decline during the first half of the twentieth century. However, comparisons drawn between the characteristics and role of family firms in the United States, Germany and Japan suggest that it is not possible to describe them in a way which transcends either chronological or geographical boundaries. Comparisons of the behaviour and performance of family firms and managerial enterprises suggest that, contrary to Chandler's view, as a concept the family firm offers a limited understanding of the differential industrial performance of competing national economies before World War II. National and corporate cultural differences are seen to have been more important influences on business behaviour than contrasting organisational structures.     

The Effect of Entrepreneurship Orientation on Firm Performance: A Multiple Mediation Model

Scholars have recognized the important role that entrepreneurial orientation (EO) plays in driving firm performance. However, this relationship is not yet well understood and studies have sought to examine various contingencies that might mediate or moderate this relationship. This study investigates the impact of organization behavior variables on the EO – firm performance relationship. The structural model was tested using primary data from 321 South Korean industrial firms. The results show that EO is positively related to firm performance and that adaptive organizational culture and people-centered management have a multiple mediating effect on the relationship between EO and firm performance.     

Targeting Firm Births and Economic Regeneration in a Lagging Region

This paper provides a critical evaluation of the practice of targeting the firm birth rate as part of a regional regeneration policy. It raises some fundamental questions about the appropriateness of such a practice and shows that different specifications of the birth rate generate very different implications for policy intervention, as measured by the number of births required. It also demonstrates that even when the specification is agreed, the translation of the target into actual numbers of births is far from straightforward, especially where the target aspires to match a region’s performance with what is going on elsewhere and where the survival rate of businesses is also being targeted in parallel. The North East of England is used as the particular context for the evaluation, although the discussion has much wider applicability.     

家族资源支持类型与家族创业:基于家族义务与创业者素质视角——兼对家族社会资本研究的一个补充

家族资本(人力、财务、社会)是家族创业的重要资源基础,现有文献普遍认为基于信任的家族社会资本是家族人力和财务资本(即家族资源)进入家族创业的唯一路径,这显然将问题简单化.家族的权力结构与情感关系决定了家族成员之间存在着复杂的家族义务.这种家族义务超出了信任或家族社会资本的概念范围并影响着家族成员的行为,同时与创业者创业素质一起决定了家族资源对家族创业的支持类型.这些类型主要包括信任、计算契约、纯粹利他、互惠利他四种.家族资源支持类型的不同还对家族创业成功产生影响.     

TMT社会网络、公司创业与企业绩效关系研究

拥有大量内外部信息资源的高管团队(TMT),其社会网络不但可以提供公司创业的机会来源,也是企业现在绩效和未来绩效的影响因素。TMT的社会网络只有通过公司创业机制才能转化为企业绩效的价值创造过程。中国背景下的实证研究显示:TMT社会网络、公司创业都与企业绩效正相关,对于企业而言,要高度重视通过管理手段激励整个高管团队的所有成员去构建有效的内外部社会网络;公司创业的价值增值中介作用也得到证实,公司创业发挥着重要的资源整合作用,有价值的TMT内外部社会网络只有充分融入企业的产品或服务创新,以及深层次的战略更新过程中,为企业的价值增值服务,才能转变为企业绩效。     

家族控股、终极所有权与企业绩效——来自我国上市公司的经验证据

借鉴Driffield等(2007)的研究方法,运用终极产权论追踪上市公司的终极控股股东,分析我国家族企业金字塔结构下的控股股东和终极所有权对企业绩效的影响。研究发现:第一大股东持股比例与企业绩效呈倒U型关系,第二至五大股东持股比例之和与企业绩效呈U型关系;家族上市公司的企业绩效与家族控股股东的控制权负相关,与现金流权正相关,与超控制权负相关;另外,家族上市公司的企业绩效与是否委派管理层负相关,与董事长与总经理是否合一负相关。同时,按家族控股股东的控制权大小分组检验也得到了类似的结论。     

Entrepreneurship in the Region: Breeding Ground for Nascent Entrepreneurs?

This paper employs data from the German Socioeconomic Panel (SOEP) and data from the German Social Insurance Statistics to study nascent entrepreneurship. In particular, micro data from the SOEP characterizing employees and nascent entrepreneurs is combined with data characterizing the entrepreneurial environment. The principal findings suggest that individuals are embedded in their local entrepreneurial environment which influences an individual especially at the beginning of the decision process about whether to become self-employed. Work and previous self-employment experience is more important than formal education for the likelihood of being a nascent entrepreneur. Furthermore, social capital is an important stimulus for nascent entrepreneurs. Finally, the results indicate that financial assets are less important for nascent entrepreneurs.