Search results

This study explores the impact of family ownership and management on exploitative and exploratory outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) in family businesses in emerging economies, as well as the moderating effects of intra-family successions and founder CEOs.

The authors empirically tested the hypotheses based on the data of Chinese listed manufacturing family enterprises from 2009 to 2018.

Family ownership does not significantly reduce exploitative OFDI but significantly increases exploratory OFDI. When family offspring have succession intentions, these relationships are strengthened. Additionally, family management is negatively associated with exploitative OFDI and positively associated with exploratory OFDI. Founder CEOs have a positive moderating effect on the relationship between family management and exploitative and exploratory OFDI.

This study is the first attempt to introduce exploitative and exploratory OFDI into the internationalization of family enterprises. The research goes beyond internationalization as a single concept and provides new evidence to solve the controversy about how family involvement affects family firms’ internationalization. On the other hand, the authors respond to the call to understand the impact of family heterogeneity on internationalization by systematically examining the influence of four important family heterogeneity characteristics on family firms’ OFDI choice.

Based on the socio-emotional wealth and agency theories, this study empirically investigates the impact of family ownership and management on green innovation (GI) in family businesses, as well as the moderating effects of institutional environmental support factors, namely, the technological achievement marketisation index and the market-rule-of law index.

This study empirically tests the hypotheses based on a sample of listed Chinese family companies with A-shares in 14 heavily polluting industries from 2009 to 2019.

There is a U-shaped relationship between the percentage of family ownership and GI, and an inverted U-shaped relationship between the degree of family management and GI. Additionally, different institutional environmental support factors affect these relationships in different ways. As the technological achievement marketisation index increases, the U-shaped relationship between the percentage of family ownership and GI becomes steeper, while the inverted U-shaped relationship between the degree of family management and GI becomes smoother. The market rule-of-law index weakens the U-shaped relationship between family ownership and GI.

First, the authors enrich the research on the driving factors of GI from the perspective of the most essential heterogeneity of family businesses. This study shows nonlinear and opposite effects of family ownership and management on GI in family firms. Second, this study contributes to the literature on family firm innovation. GI, not considered by researchers, is regarded as an important deficiency in research on innovation in family businesses. Therefore, this study fills that gap. Third, the study expands research on moderating effects in the literature on GI from the perspective of institutional environmental support factors.

Based on the theory of bounded rationality, the purpose of this paper is to explore the role played by top managerial management cognition in firms' efforts to obtain and maintain competitive advantage in a dynamic environment.

A research framework of the relations between environment changes, management cognition, strategic actions, organizational capability evolution and organizational performance is built. Data are collected through interviews, internal documents, and external documents and consequently a qualitative database is built to construct a causal map between environment, cognition, strategic actions, and organizational capability. Then by applying this causal map, a case study analysis of Vanward Group is carried out to explore its management cognition, strategic actions, and organizational capability in a dynamic environment.

The research propositions were tested and confirmed that top managerial management cognition is of bounded rationality and in dynamic environment it exerts direct and critical effect on their firms' strategic actions and organizational capability. Further discussion is extended to the roles played by institutional factors in organizational strategic decision process and the roles of top management in organizational dynamic capability.

The generalizability of this paper's conclusions to other firms is to be tested by large sample quantitative research.

The research confirms the bounded rationality perspective in strategic management, and explores in depth the formation, evolution, and functions of top management cognition in a dynamic environment. It also emphasizes the non‐economic factors related to the continuous acquisition and maintenance of competitive advantages in a dynamic environment.

The paper releases the economic assumptions underlying industrial structure theory and resource‐based views by emphasizing the effect of top management cognition on organizational strategic actions and organizational capabilities. It further enriches the institution‐based view by illustrating how institutional environment affects top management cognition and consequently affects the changes in organizational strategic actions and organizational capability. Thus, the institutional context for organizational strategic decision making is emphasized. The paper contributes to research in dynamic capability by emphasizing top management roles in developing dynamic capability.