Mapping family firm internationalization research: bibliometric and literature review

Vitality and Continuity of Family Businesses

“…The authors searched for the problems of interruption in the succession of FB in the literature (Corral & Rebori, 2019;Alayo et al, 2020). The keywords in the literature search were: long-term family management, knowledge sharing, planning intergenerational communication, personal interaction, increased communication and reflection competence, long-term strategy, multigenerational learning, overall quality management, closer customer interaction, socio-emotive wealth, internationalization process, the interaction between "district effect" and "family effect", corporate culture, adaptation, tradition.…”

Abandoning Family Management - Analysis of the effects on exports

“…Despite the accumulating literature on the relationship between family managed firms and internationalization, there is a lack of consensus about whether family managed firms are more likely to export. A number of recent reviews have been published so far about the relationship between family firms and internationalization (Alayo et al, 2020;Arregle et al, 2017;Casillas & Moreno-Menéndez, 2017;Casprini et al, 2020;Kontinen & Ojala, 2010;Metsola et al, 2020). For example, whereas some studies (Kontinen & Ojala, 2011) find that the small size and flexibility of management teams in family firms allow them to react quickly to new international opportunities, others (Gomez-Mejia et al, 2010;Miller et al, 2008) conclude that family firms exhibit lower levels of internationalization than non-family firms due to their concern with preserving the family control of the business.…”

“…Strengthening this argument, the Stewardship Perspective (SP) states that the long-term perspective of family firms and their perceived higher social capital and commitment are traits which favour exports (Davis et al, 1997;Miller & Le Breton-Miller, 2005;Miller et al, 2008). Despite extensive work in the internationalization literature on family firms and how their governance might impact internationalization (Alayo et al, 2020;Casprini et al, 2020;De Massis et al, 2015), no study has yet demonstrated what happens when a family firm decides to abandon or retain family control of the business. We answer this question using a panel of 805 firms, 61 of which changed their management status during the period 2012-2013.…”

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“…Most often, therefore, they value tradition and are used to operating in local markets known to them (Mitter et al, 2014), where they have developed close ties with local communities (Steinerowska-Streb, 2016). Therefore, compared to non-family firms, many family-owned businesses adopt conservative strategies Long-term orientation of family firms and the concern of the family with future generations can also have a positive impact on their internationalization (Alayo et al, 2020). They can perceive expansion beyond the internal market as an opportunity to grow and survive in a changing environment (Pukall, and Calabrò, 2014).…”

“…To date, relatively few comparative analyses concerning the internationalization of family and non-family firms have been conducted. They generally show that the internationalization process varies in family and non-family businesses (Alayo et al, 2020) and, compared to nonfamily businesses, family businesses expand abroad later, more slowly and avoiding risk (Mitter et al, 2014). Accordingly, the characteristics of family businesses may therefore not only influence their propensity for internationalization, but they may also lead them to choose different internationalization strategies for foreign expansion compared to non-family businesses (Mitter et al, 2014).…”