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Family firms play an important role in the working of the Canadian economy; despite their importance to the economic activities and job creation it is observed that family businesses have lower survival rates than non‐family firms, some argue that this can possibly be attributed (amongst other factors) to the lack of training. Most of the training activities in Canadian family businesses tend to be limited, and it is argued that family firms tend to perceive training more as an expense than an asset that enhances future growth and development of the business. This paper introduces a training framework and a coherent strategy that provides key elements of a national training agenda for Canadian small family firms, including the role of various relevant organizations.

There are increasing signs that business‐to‐business marketers are targeting the 50 percent of all US companies which are family firms. New theory from the family business studies field creates a reasonable expectation that the buyer behavior of family firms is distinctive, but there has been, to date, no empirical validation of this hypothesis. This exploratory study of 124 businesses contrasts family and non‐family firms on four dimensions of purchasing and finds that family business engage in more protracted pre‐purchase search processes, and require more interaction with their providers but reward providers with higher propensity to engage in positive word‐of‐mouth behaviors and repurchase intentions. These findings are both consistent with emerging theory in the field and relevant to marketers to family businesses.

The complexity of succession in family firms is multifaceted and can sometimes lead to turbulence. While structured succession strategies offer a roadmap for smoother transitions, intergenerational differences in family small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can lead to varied interpretations of an effective succession blueprint. This study synergizes the strategic entrepreneurship framework with the socioemotional wealth (SEW) perspective to probe into how formalized succession planning impacts performance in family SMEs. Furthermore, it delves into the mediating role of succession satisfaction, especially in family firms characterized by pronounced SEW and helmed by CEOs from different generational cohorts.

Employing a comprehensive dataset from 1,833 global family businesses, this research utilizes bootstrapping regression models to discern the intertwined effects of mediator and moderator variables and their statistical significance.

The main findings suggest that succession satisfaction does matter for a good succession process and that succession plans work only in family firms with a high degree of SEW and that are led by older family CEOs (e.g. baby boomers).

The results offer fresh perspectives on succession processes, with a particular focus on how to improve the satisfaction of millennial family CEOs.

The study uniquely combines strategic entrepreneurship and SEW to offer a holistic view of succession planning, highlighting satisfaction’s mediating role and SEW’s moderating influence. Additionally, it pioneers the incorporation of generational cohorts into the succession discourse.

This article explains the causal mechanism supporting sustainable longevity by analysing the last three generations of one of the oldest family firms in Latin America.

An explanatory single-case qualitative research based on critical realism explores why and how this family firm has been able to maintain its multigenerational longevity.

Los Lingues's evolutionary strategy, driven by transgenerational entrepreneurship under effectuation, has supported this family firm's sustainable longevity. Its effectual logic emerged mainly from the richness of the firm's historical resources embedded in its identity, knowledge and social capital and priority to preserve socioemotional wealth.

This study integrates socioemotional wealth and effectuation theory to explain a family firm's ability to survive through generations and sustain longevity. The study demonstrates the relevance of effectual logic in the entrepreneurial dynamics of a multigenerational family firm. Effectual logic drives the firm evolution and adaptation for sustainable longevity.

This study examines how women and men in family firms respond differently when asked about perceptions of financial performance. The study poses three research questions around this topic: Are there differences among female and male responses, do those perceptions change if men and women are leaders of the family business and does the family's socioemotional wealth (SEW) influence such responses.

This study uses a quantitative research design to determine if financial performance perceptions of family firms differ based on the gender of the respondents and their leadership position, and second, if SEW's dimensions influence those perceptions, using data from the Successful Transgenerational Entrepreneurship Practices (STEP) survey in 2015.

The findings indicate that due to the lack of theory regarding gender as a social construct, empirical data collected for family business studies should take under consideration if respondents are women, men, leaders and the family influence in the family business when collecting data from surveys and asking for perceptions of financial performance. Results show that women in family businesses tend to have more positive perceptions of financial performance than men, but if women are leaders, those perceptions not only decrease but become negative. In addition, the family's socioemotional wealth (SEW) exacerbates those tendencies.

This study contributes to the literature by helping to understand the potential limitations of subjective measures of financial performance, as women increasingly become family business leaders. It also contributes to gender studies by demonstrating that there is a lack of gender theoretical perspectives specifically, gender roles, suggesting that differences in self-promotion and self-evaluation between men and women leaders of their family firms. Finally, this study adds to the study of SEW as a multidimensional construct by showing the different effects, or lack of them by each dimension and showing the strong effect of family continuity on the perception of financial performance.

While previous studies have proved the significance of family firm innovativeness (FFI), the question of how the emotion-regulation capabilities of family business managers affect FFI still remains open. This paper aims to examine the impact of the emotion-regulation capabilities of family business managers on FFI moderated by the family involvement in business management.

The present study is based on a quantitative research design. Data were collected with the help of a telephone survey. Overall, 192 family firms were surveyed, and the results were analysed using structural equation modelling (SEM).

The findings indicate that managers' emotion-regulation capabilities (independent variable) positively impact FFI (dependent variable). The research results also indicate that having more family members involved in the business (moderating variable) can lead to better innovation outcomes, assuming these family managers have sufficient emotion-regulating capabilities.

The research context could be broadened by differentiating between the industries in which family firms operate. This could aid a better understanding of the challenges, opportunities and market trends in different sectors. Future research might also include more diverse countries with deep family business traditions, strengthening the robustness of the findings across more varied contexts.

Using a multi-level perspective, this study contributes to the dynamic managerial capabilities and family business literature by showing that, in an environment where familial relationships can affect working relationships, the ability of managers to control their emotions and others' emotions can be a critical managerial resource that impacts FFI.

This study explores family firms' ex ante conflict management strategies to preserve their socioemotional wealth (SEW) under predictable conflict through the succession process. Specifically, the authors examine how family firms leverage the insurance-like benefits of corporate social responsibility (CSR) to mitigate the threat of foreseeable family feuds among the sons of firms' family heads.

The authors focus on the charitable donations pledged by Korean family business groups (chaebols). Using the data of 62 chaebols with generalized least squares (GLS) models, the authors analyze 711 observations from 2005 to 2017.

The authors find a positive relationship between the number of sons of a family firm's head and the firm's CSR activities such as spending on charitable donations. Furthermore, the number of daughters of heads in executive positions strengthens such a positive relationship, whereas the number of business and political marriage ties weakens this relationship.

Family heads of family businesses may leverage CSR activities and marriage ties to elite families interchangeably to ward off negative impacts from foreseeable family feuds and preserve their SEW. Thus, a policy-based incentive for CSR that encourages more family heads to use CSR as insurance would serve the public interest.

The authors contribute to the family business literature by suggesting that CSR activities can be used by family firms as an instrument to mitigate foreseeable damage to the SEW caused by family feuds. The authors also shed new light on CSR research by finding that marriage ties to elite families may reduce the strategic value of CSR activities.

Compared to Whites, People of Color (POC) in the USA face substantial cultural, structural and institutional challenges on their paths to entrepreneurial success. Many of these challenges have their roots in institutional racism—pervasive discriminatory practices and policies found within institutions. Institutional theory suggests that organizations gain access to institutions and resources when they conform to “appropriate” business practices. How does the reality of institutional racism square with institutional theory when many of those institutions, like banks, are fundamentally afflicted by racist practices and norms? Can another institution, the family, act as a resource substitute to provide POC business owners the necessary resources for success?

Focusing on White-, Black- and Asian-American business owners, the authors analyze data from the USA. Census's Annual Business Survey.

Despite vast performance differences between POC- and White-owned businesses, family firms of every racial group outperform their same-race nonfamily counterparts. Idiosyncratic resources families bring into family firms, known as familiness, appear to help mitigate the challenges to entrepreneurial success that POC face.

Policy makers should consider specific types of support different entrepreneurs require given the kinds of hurdles racial minorities continue to face in the USA.

Despite scholarly attention on family firm heterogeneity, there is scant research on race.

This research is one of the first to explore the implications of institutional racism on institutional theory and the first to employ this concept within the context of family firms.

Although it is a well-known notion that “a family firm does not survive beyond the third generation”, owing to the ineffective tacit knowledge transfer, studies investigating the relationship between generational evolution and knowledge innovation is scarce. Thus, this case study revolving Sin Kwang Plastic Resources Berhad (SKP) seeks to address this gap in literature.

To assess the development of family business, a longitudinal case study was performed by documenting the entire evolutionary process starting from its establishment until now. The historical profiles for SKP were obtained from the previous annual reports submitted to the government's Companies Commission (SSM). Secondary materials from the Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM) and the edge newspaper and articles on the company were also gathered. Throughout the in-depth interviews, the author can see how the next generation of this family firm innovates and implements tacit knowledge innovation in original equipment manufacturing (OEM) by adhering to the Japanese industrial standards.

Findings show that the second generation utilized the company's extensive knowledge in plastic contract manufacturing in SKP for tacit knowledge conversion, triggers the birth of STS Tecnic Berhad, a subsidiary company that manufactures plastic parts for the industrial packaging and automotive industry. To simplify the process of managing the complex business, SKP opted to “prune the family tree” by dividing the business, involving fewer managers and restricting the number of family shareholders.

This case study traces how Gan's family's tacit knowledge in plastic contract manufacturing have been acquired from the experience of contract manufacturing with the Japanese multinational corporations (MNCs) by further commercializing the tacit knowledge into different companies for different plants. SKP promotes tacit knowledge innovation in the learning organization, thus responding to the firm's sustainability.

This study demonstrates that knowledge transformation plays vital roles in product development and gaining competitive advantage. The success of this business is founded by the building of shared values, norms and technical understanding in plastic contract manufacturing among the Japanese MNCs in Malaysia.

The purpose of this study is to explore how the family firm identity is affected when it is no longer publicly communicated.

A case study approach was used to follow a third-generation family business, a large Swedish home electronics firm that acquired a competitor and, initially, continued using its family firm identity after the acquisition. This study longitudinally tracks the company and its owning family using archival data combined with interviews.

The case company decided to stop communicating their identity as a family business. Such a move initially appears counterintuitive, since it potentially threatens the family firm identity and leads the firm to forgo other advantages, e.g. in branding. However, the decision was based on arguments that were rational from a business perspective, leading to a decoupling of family and firm identity.

This study contributes to the literature by showing a decoupling of internally experienced and externally communicated identities. It further contributes to the understanding of the family firm identity concept.