Performance and Behavior of Family Firms

<p>Family involvement characterizes a large number of firms around the world and is thought to significantly impact their strategies behavior and performance. Family involvement occurs when a family exerts control over the firm through ownership and management. When family involvement leads to intentions to pursue particularistic goals and strategies controlling families are more likely to exert a significant influence on firm strategies behavior and performance. Indeed intentions imply that a firm’s strategic behaviors will be oriented toward preserving the economic and socioemotional value of the firm for the family in the long term. Hence the “essence” of a family firm is thought to be a function of a family’s influence on the culture functioning and behavior of the firm owing to the pursuit of a family’s vision for the firm.</p><p>As a result family firm behavior is expected to be distinct from those in non-family firms. Despite the inherent differences between family and non-family firms and heterogeneity among family firms family involvement is under-researched in organizational studies which limits the generalization of findings and leads to theoretical ambiguity. Financial strategic decisions and activities may be key to understanding differences between family and non-family firms.</p><p>Therefore we invited researchers to shed light on how a family uses its influence to affect financial strategies behavior and firm performance.<br /> </p>