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Microenterprises (MEs) are vital to the growth and prosperity of economies around the world. All levels of society, from universities to national governments, have collaborated to improve the chances of survival and future growth of these businesses. The threat to life is serious, and unless concerted action is taken, the situation will spiral out of control. Policymakers and business leaders must work together to address the sustainability crisis. The study, therefore, set out to determine how various entrepreneurial skills (such as creativity, collaboration, networking, and risk-taking) affect the long-term viability of MEs. The overall objective of the study was to determine the importance of innovative problem-solving, collaboration, networking, and willingness to take calculated risks of microentrepreneurs for the long-term success of their businesses. A total of 274 microentrepreneurs in rural areas of the Ancash region of Peru were surveyed in the grocery, hardware, clothing, and food service sectors. The survival of the MEs was tested on four dimensions: innovation, leadership, networking, and risk-taking. According to the results, MEs managers can increase their longevity by cultivating creative skills, strengthening leadership as a key to business sustainability and survival, maximizing the use of networks to gain a market advantage and expand their customer base, and employing calculated risk-taking.

The vulnerability of the tourism industry to an array of risks, encompassing family-related, small- and medium-sized enterprise-specific, strategic, tourism-specific and external factors, highlights the landscape within which small and medium family enterprises (SMFEs) operate. Although SMFEs are an important stakeholder in the dynamic tourism sector, they are not one homogenous group of firms, but have different strategic orientations. This study aims to investigate the interplay between strategic orientation and risk perception to better understand SMFEs risk perception as it is impacting their decision-making processes, resilience and long-term survival. The authors investigate how different strategic orientations contribute to different perspectives on risk among owner-managers.

Based on a qualitative data corpus of 119 face-to-face interviews, the authors apply various coding rounds to better understand the relationship between strategic orientations and the perceptions of risks. Firstly, the authors analysed the owner–manager interviews and identified three groups of different strategic orientations: proactive and sustainability-oriented SMFE, destination-affirmative and resilience-oriented SMFE and passive SMFE. Secondly, the authors coded the interviews for different risks identified. The authors identified that the three groups show differences in the risk perceptions.

The data unveil that the three groups of SMFEs have several differences in how they perceive risks. Proactive and sustainability-oriented SMFEs prioritize business risks, demonstrating a penchant for innovation and sustainability. Destination-affirmative and resilience-oriented SMFEs perceive a broader range of risks, tying their investments to destination development, emphasizing family and health risks and navigating competitive pressures. Passive SMFEs, primarily concerned with external risks, exhibit limited awareness of internal and strategic risks, resist change and often defer decision-making to successors. The findings underscore how different strategic orientations influence risk perceptions and decision-making processes within SMFEs in the tourism industry.

The authors contribute to existing knowledge include offering a comprehensive status quo of perceived risks for different strategic orientations, a notably underexplored area. In addition, the differences with respect to risk perception shown in the paper suggest that simplified models ignoring risk perception may be insufficient for policy recommendations and for understanding the dynamics of the tourism sector. For future research, the authors propose to focus on exploring the possible directions in which strategic orientation and risk perception influence one another, which might be a limitation of this study due to its qualitative nature.

Varying strategic orientations and risk perceptions highlight the diversity within the stakeholder group of SMFE. Recognizing differences allows for more targeted interventions that address the unique concerns and opportunities of each group and can thus improve the firm’s resilience (Memili et al., 2023) and therefore leading to sustainability destinations development. The authors suggest practical support for destination management organizations and regional policymakers, aimed especially at enhancing the risk management of passive SMFEs. Proactive SMFE could be encouraged to perceive more family risks.

Viewing tourism destinations as a complex stakeholder network, unveiling distinct risk landscapes for various strategic orientations of one stakeholder has the potential to benefit the overall destination development. The proactive and sustainability-oriented SMFEs are highly pertinent as they might lead destinations to further development and create competitive advantage through innovative business models. Passive SMFEs might hinder the further development of the destination, e.g. through missing innovation efforts or succession.

Although different studies explore business risks (Forgacs and Dimanche, 2016), risks from climate change (Demiroglu et al., 2019), natural disasters (Zhang et al., 2023) or shocks such as COVID-19 (Teeroovengadum et al., 2021), this study shows that it does not imply that SMFE as active stakeholder perceive such risk. Rather, different strategic orientations are in relation to perceiving risks differently. The authors therefore open up an interesting new field for further studies, as risk perception influences the decision-making of tourism actors, and therefore resilience.

Many scholars and practitioners in the fields of business and management have recently published theoretical and empirical studies on the subject of business culture and its impact on its growth and effectiveness; yet, there has been a dearth of research on the topic of how organizational culture affects productivity. Moreover, there are hardly any theoretical or empirical research that examines these two concepts within the context of a micro-enterprise. This chapter uses a sample of 279 Ancash Region microenterprises to investigate the effect of local entrepreneurial culture on businesses’ overall performance. Among the four types of entrepreneurial cultures studied, only the Hierarchical culture was shown to have no effect on the degree of performance of the microenterprises. There is evidence of a significant causal relationship between the variables studied, the coefficient of determination was; business performance (r² = 0.796), with an SRMR of 0.037, the confirmatory model is relevant within its range of accuracy, while market culture has the greatest impact on business performance.

The primary objective of this study is to analyze the performance and risk characteristics of portfolios composed of Spanish family businesses (FBs) when sustainability and quality factors are taken into account. By comparing different portfolio compositions against a benchmark, the study aims to provide insights into the impact of these factors on portfolio performance.

This study employs an empirical approach to evaluate the performance and risk of portfolios consisting of Spanish family businesses (FBs) by incorporating sustainability and quality factors. It compares the results of various portfolios against a benchmark, utilizing GARCH models and the extended six-factor model of Fama and French for the period 2018–2023.

The findings reveal that investing in Spanish family businesses (FBs) yields higher returns compared to the index, with portfolios incorporating quality factors demonstrating superior performance. However, the inclusion of sustainability factors negatively affects portfolio performance. These results highlight the significance of considering sustainability and quality factors in portfolio construction and investment decisions.

This study contributes to the existing literature by examining the performance and risk implications of incorporating sustainability and quality factors into portfolios of family businesses. The findings offer valuable insights for investors and managers interested in constructing portfolios or developing financial products that balance risk and return effectively.

This study aims to explore how emotional intelligence (EI) in members of family businesses can enhance the relationships with the stakeholders and whether adopting a relationship marketing approach could extend a family businesses' longevity, the businesses' success through generations.

A mixed-method approach was adopted, and two studies (quantitative followed by qualitative) were conducted in Mexico on small to medium-sized enterprises. This study considers the perspective of owners and employers of family businesses.

The study provides important insights into the relationship between EI and relationship marketing. Enhancing EI in family members whilst conducting a relationship marketing approach, both internal and external, will result in better performance. Family businesses can alleviate conflicts inherent to family emotions whilst building and maintaining strong relationships with customers and suppliers that can secure the long-term success of the organisation by enhancing EI.

Considering the majority of the literature is focussed on highly developed economies such as the USA, the UK and major developing economies such as China and India, this mixed-method study offers Mexico as a novel setting that has become an important procurement hub in light of the recent global developments and international relationship policies.

The search for competitiveness by family-owned companies has led us to research topics that may help these companies succeed. The management of human capital is undoubtedly one of the keys to success, and the practices of employee development (training, promotion, succession, career planning, mentoring and coaching) help improve the performance of these companies.

This paper is based on studying a sample of 560 family companies and analyzing the relationship between performance of the family businesses and the use of employee development practices. The techniques used were confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling.

The results show that employee development has a direct effect on the indicators of performance in family companies. The authors have developed a series of practical implications for companies that justify investments in and efforts with regard to employee career development.

Family businesses need to understand the development needs of their employees. In addition, the very processes and tasks performed. The authors have developed a number of practical implications for companies that justify the investments and efforts made in employee career development. This work validates the usefulness of the use of certain practices for the development of employees in family businesses, allowing the company to generate human capital to build a competitive position in the market.

The results of this study suggest that family businesses should understand the development needs of their employees and that various practices are available to help detect these needs. Family businesses should see individual development processes as an opportunity to improve the performance of employees, which could avoid conflicts in such businesses (Qiu and Freel, 2020). Companies should develop career and succession plans that enable these changes to be faced throughout the company, ensuring that when handover occurs, the candidates are sufficiently qualified in accordance with their career paths. The present research study shows that coaching is a powerful tool for improving performance. Moreover, mentoring appears to be an important part of employee development. For this reason, mentoring programs should be formally planned with designated objectives. In addition, family businesses should provide employees with real opportunities for promotion and the development of their skills and abilities, which is a way to retain nonfamily professionals (Ramankutty and Pujar, 2017).

Family businesses are a very important part of the productive activity of a country and their continuity is necessary to maintain employment and income. The management of people in family businesses is a key aspect for their success, therefore knowing the key aspects for the development of human capital will have a positive influence on maintaining employment and income.

This paper addresses the study of people development processes in family businesses and proves its usefulness to improve performance, considering the formal planning of succession processes and professional careers, providing qualifications to candidates and ensuring that they are show satisfaction with their professional evolution in the company. Likewise, it is positive for family businesses to use coaching relationships, formally scheduled and employing a coach from abroad. The other tool that will favor the development of employees is mentoring, formally programmed, establishing objectives and properly studying the mentor's profile. For this tool to be applied successfully, it is necessary to get the participants to commit to the mentoring process. Finally, the organization must provide its employees with real opportunities to promote, training them and developing their skills.

This article aims to explore how cluster affiliation moderates the relationship between family involvement and speed of internationalization in family firms. The speed of internationalization is examined in terms of earliness and post-internationalization speed.

The research is based on a sample of 639 Portuguese family businesses (FBs) created and internationalized between 2010 and 2018 that was retrieved from the Iberian Balance Analysis System – SABI database. The partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to assess the measurement and construct the model.

The results suggest that higher levels of family involvement in ownership and management make family firms enter on international markets in later stages of their development but, after the first international market entry, the firms are able to exhibit a higher post-internationalization speed. When considering the effect of cluster affiliation, the authors found that clustered FBs are more likely to engage in early internationalization and to accelerate the post-internationalization process than non-clustered FBs.

The study's findings are explained by the existence of socially proximate relationships with other cluster members, based on similarity, trust, knowledge exchange and sense of belonging, which push family firms to internationalize and increase their level of international commitment over time. The empirical evidence, therefore, highlights the primary role of industrial clusters in moderating the relationship between family involvement, earliness of internationalization and post-internationalization speed.

The study aims to analyze for the Spanish context the influence of the involvement of several generations in the firm's management on family firm internationalization. The authors also respond to the call in the literature to consider the influence of SEW on family firm internationalizations by analyzing the moderating effect of the importance family managers attach to each of the socioemotional wealth (SEW) dimensions – enrichment, continuity and prominence on the relationship between multiple generations involved in management and family firm internationalization.

The information was obtained by means of a questionnaire sent to the CEOs of family businesses. The authors’ sample consists of 147 Spanish family firms.

The authors find that the involvement of multiple generations in management is positively related to the internationalization of family firms. Furthermore, the importance that family CEOs attribute to the enrichment dimension of SEW reduces the intensity of the effect of the involvement of several generations in management on family firm internationalization.

The authors’ results, for the Spanish context, complement previous studies (Meneses et al., 2014) showing that the entry of new generations into the family business opens a window of opportunity for the internationalization of the family business. Furthermore, their study shows that the diverse family objectives by CEOs can have different, even conflicting effects on the internationalization decision. These results suggest that the enrichment dimension, which focuses on the short-term family goals may restrain the internationalization of the family business. However, continuity and prominence dimensions, which are related with long term family objectives and jointly enable the fulfillment of nonfamily stakeholders’ objectives, do not influence the internationalization of the family firms analyzed.

The article aims at analyzing the social representations of retirement in two different groups of professors – pre-retired and retired – from a public higher education institution. The goal is to explore the experiences, reflections, beliefs, and attitudes originated from the transition to retirement.

The research, of exploratory and descriptive nature, was guided by the Social Representation Theory (SRT) and took a qualitative approach. 16 professors were interviewed, 8 in each group (pre-retired and retired professors), using semi-structured interviews that followed a script designed to discover the main aspects of the transition to retirement.

Three figurative cores were raised – the financial aspect, the centrality of work, and the will to continue contributing, and the unpreparedness for retirement – and testimonies have shown heterogeneous representations. The study observed that although relevant, the bonus for continued services is not the main determinant for professors to continue working in the university.

The results of this study indicate the need to treat retirement as a complex and multidimensional process, offering a fresh perspective on the social representations of retirement in the academic context. The use of the Social Representation Theory to explore these perspectives adds to the originality of the approach, highlighting the multifaceted nature of the retirement process in this specific professional group.