Corporate Entrepreneurship in Family Firms: A Family Perspective

Abstract

Entrepreneurship has been recognized as an important factor contributing to firm success. Despite the potential benefit of corporate entrepreneurship to sustain the family firm across generations, corporate entrepreneurship has been underresearched in the family firm literature. We investigate how generational involvement, willingness to change, and the ability to recognize technological opportunities impact corporate entrepreneurship in family firms. We also examine strategic planning in family firms as a facilitating process. Our findings suggest that willingness to change and technological opportunity recognition are positively related to corporate entrepreneurship in family firms. We further found strategic planning to significantly moderate the relationships between (1) generational involvement and (2) technological opportunity recognition and corporate entrepreneurship. These findings and implications for management and research are discussed.

Entrepreneurial orientation and firm performance in family SMEs: the moderating effects of family, women, and strategic involvement in the board of directors

“…Further evidence is needed on the causal relationships between the dependent and independent variables through longitudinal research. However, we based our hypotheses on existing theory (e.g., Rauch et al 2009) and tested for common method bias (Podsakoff and Organ 1986), and did not find any concerns that may have affected our results (Kellermanns and Eddleston 2006). However, future research could help explain the potential changes in firm performance over time by collecting longitudinal data on CEOs' views of EO, SIBD, and board composition in their firms.…”

“…We included this variable based on prior research indicating that family firm generation has a significant effect on EO (Cruz and Nordqvist 2012). Fifth, we controlled for generational involvement, measured as a dummy variable using a direct single item in which CEOs indicated the number of generations (one, two, three, or more) currently involved in the firm's management (Kellermanns and Eddleston 2006). Previous studies show that the number of generations involved in the top management team influences the level of family firm EO (Sciascia et al 2013).…”

Audit Quality: The Role of Board Structure in Family Firms

“…Many prior studies (e.g Westhead et al, 2002;Schulze et al, 2003a;Sonfield and Lussier, 2004;Jaffe and Lane, 2004;Kellermanns and Eddleston, 2006;Bammens et al, 2008) argue that several family attributes may change throughout time as the ownership structure changes. If descendants join the firm, this will increase the potential for conflicts of interest concerning business issues, diverging views and information asymmetries between owners and manager.…”

Family entrepreneurship as a field of research: Exploring its contours and contents

“…For example, the literature suggests that different family ties within a firm are associated with a more diverse set of interests 21 and ambitions among family members (Gersick, Davis, McCollom, & Lansberg, 1997). These diverse interests and ambitions may in turn lead to a higher level of political activity required to unite around common goals (Kellermanns & Eddleston, 2006) and affect negatively firm performance (Eddleston & Kellermanns, 2007;Kellermanns & Eddleston, 2004).…”