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This commentary elaborates further upon the work by Martin and Gomez-Mejia (this issue) about the two-way relationship between financial wealth and socioemotional wealth (SEW). This paper aims to provide a better understanding of the micro-foundations of the SEW approach, and how the research community could further develop it based on the SEW behavioral roots.

The paper explores recent refinements of the SEW approach, its underpinnings, limitations and potential. It undertook a review of the behavioral foundations of SEW, exploring the implications of those foundations in the interplay between SEW and financial wealth. It also examines aspects of SEW that are still under researched using behavioral lens, as well as some ideas about how the field could move forward.

The authors note that the SEW approach has become so widespread that some are wrongly using it just as an “umbrella term” to account for the non-economic utilities of family owners, forgoing its theoretical roots and implications. Drawing on its theoretical foundations, the authors theorize on the limitations of the SEW approach when wrongly used, and on its potential when properly applied. The main conclusion is that if the SEW approach aims at becoming a dominant paradigm in the family business field, then going back to its behavioral foundations is needed.

The main conclusion is that if the SEW approach aims at becoming a dominant paradigm in the family business field, then going back to its behavioral foundations is needed.

Overall, this work calls for the use of a “back-to-the-basics” strategy, in which the field clearly understands the original purpose of the SEW perspective, as well as its limitations and potential to become a dominant paradigm in the family business field.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the pedagogical tools that can enhance transdisciplinarity in higher education and stimulate sustainability transitions, based on the case study of a partnership between the University of Brasilia and an ecovillage in Brazil.

A qualitative study was carried out, based on professors’ experience, students’ reports and registration data. Emergent themes were discussed based on the concepts of sustainability transitions, transdisciplinarity and active/experiential learning methods.

Undergraduate classes at the ecovillage have motivated students to work towards sustainability transitions by presenting them with new repertoires of sociotechnical configurations and social practices, by promoting a feeling of belonging and co-responsibility for the world and by a horizontal sharing of knowledge and affections that instigated reflections about their purposes in personal and professional life.

This experience demonstrates the potential of transdisciplinary pedagogical approaches to education for sustainability that promote collaboration with different stakeholders and the reflection on individual and collective motives and values – the inner dimension of sustainability.

It describes an innovative and transformative initiative in the heart of Latin America.

The purpose of this paper is to map the process of opening an innovation network in the context of the Brazilian agroforestry sector.

Qualitative case study of the open innovation network Embrapa Florestas (17 semi-structured interviews, observation and documentary data). Social network analysis (SNA) of the open innovation network from primary data is available at Embrapa Florestas’ system.

Three primary triggers to the opening process of Embrapa Florestas’ innovation network were identified. The process starts with an innovation network with closed network characteristics. The process of opening the innovation network is motivated by a restructuring in its source of fundraising (trigger 1), by the change in strategic orientation toward the internationalization of its network activities (trigger 2) and by opening the black box of its innovation with greater proximity to the productive sector and partner universities (trigger 3). Comparing the pre-opening and post-opening networks (open innovation network), sociometric data allows us to verify that the opening of the innovation network presents better density, clustering and centrality indexes for the network as a whole and for the Embrapa Florestas specifically.

This is one of the first studies that aims to investigate the transition from a closed innovation network to an open innovation network by a public research institute. It may also be considered innovative because it presents practical and managerial relevance – in addition to contributions to public policy makers – which allows for improvements in the development of innovation and technology in the country's strategic sectors.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce the special issue on family firms in Iberoamerican countries. The special issue aims at enlarging our understanding of the uniqueness of family firms by providing new evidence from Iberoamerican countries about this widespread organizational type. The paper concludes by highlighting some areas in which the authors believe devoting more energy and resources, with new evidence from other samples, may be favourable to advancing the family business field.

The authors revise relevant literature on the subject and integrate with the content of the papers published in the special issue.

The paper introduces the articles in the special issue, places them in the current academic debate and highlights areas for future research.

Provides a view of research on family firms in Iberoamerica, with indications of relevant potential areas for future research.

The paper introduces four new articles on family firms in Iberoamerican countries and suggests areas for future research.

This chapter takes a socioemotional wealth (SEW) perspective to explain the adoption of human resource (HR) practices in family-controlled firms. Previous studies on human resource management (HRM) in family firms have focused only on a small range of HR practices and have rarely utilized strong conceptual frameworks. As a result, these studies have overlooked important factors that contribute to the distinctiveness of HRM in these organizations. Based on ample evidence that shows family businesses' preference for non-economically motivated objectives collectively labeled as SEW, we propose that the presence of SEW influences HR practices in family firms.

Consequently, we reexamine existing empirical evidence of the determinants of HRM in family-controlled firms under the SEW approach. We also reinterpret existing theoretical models of family-controlled firms and their implications for HRM under the SEW umbrella. Our final goal is to establish an integrated framework through a set of sound propositions on HRM in family businesses. By integrating the literature, we aim to fill theoretical gaps in our understanding of the determinants of HR practices in the family business context and direct future research in this area.

The purpose of this essay is to highlight the journey of the author in her early career, along with her main challenges and ways she found to overcome them.

This is an inductive account of the main experiences that the author has encountered or has observed.

This essay highlights three academic adaptation phases and steps that indicate how these can be worked to your advantage. It also depicts research opportunities and success factors.

This essay informs potential research opportunities for Ibero‐American scholars alongside key success factors for effective research.

Bizkaia, an area of just over one million inhabitants, is the setting, through the xertatu project, of an experience for fostering corporate social responsibility (CSR). This document seeks to analyze the xertatu project as a local response to a new form of governance, identifying the lessons learned in its development.

This paper focuses its analysis on a clear understanding of the need to combine not only the activities of the various organizations operating in this field in Bizkaia, but also the intentions of the agents involved, in order to shed light on the shared responsibility business has with society at large in this region.

The aggregation of agents, interests and capabilities, together with a methodology of research – collective action, is suitable for fostering social responsibility in companies.

The analysis of CSR as a new understanding of the role of business in collaborative governance, that is, as an active agent of an enabling governing style that furthermore assumes its joint responsibility with all the other agents for social cohesion and development, usually tends to lack a local and regional perspective and, therefore, the schemes that favor its implementation, whereby it could become a testing ground and benchmark for other regions.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how the familiar character of the firm affects its size and performance. Specifically, if the confluence of business and family dimensions affects their chances of survival.

With data from 581 family, small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs), the possible negative relationship between family, on the one hand, and size and performance, on the other hand is analyzed. First, the authors made a cluster analysis which distinguishes four groups attending the source of management, family next to external, and the generation, first against the rest. In addition, the authors contrast the existence of non‐linear adjustment through quadratic regressions.

Cluster analysis shows that the firms with family management in first generation are the ones with smaller size and worse performance. Regression analysis contrasts the negative relationship, but exclusively linear in nature. For all companies, regardless of the familiar character, the study confirms a negative relation of quadratic character. This paper clarifies the theories about the life cycle, so that they may be applicable to the family business. The companies must overcome the early stages, where the entrepreneurial impulse is key, to give way to more professionalized structures.

There are two fundamental contributions of this study. The first relates to the use of quadratic functions to model the relationship between family management and size and performance. The second relates to the life cycle of the family business and the role played by the family management; for that end the authors compare companies of family management in first generation with other companies to see to what extent the decision to retain a smaller size to preserve the family character is intentional.

Given the relevance of family businesses and the substantial weight that they carry within the socio‐economic make‐up of any country, this paper consists of the analysis of family firms to explore whether there are any differences between companies which grow at a faster rate than the family and those in which the family grows at a greater rate than the company, in terms of their process of succession and the professionalisation of the people involved and the methods of management. The purpose of this paper is to differentiate between different groups of family businesses through a set of independent variables.

The paper opted for discriminant analysis as an appropriate statistical tool, since it allowed the assigning of an individual to a pre‐defined group (dependent variable) on the basis of a number of characteristics (independent variables). A total of 180 family businesses were analysed.

The results of the study show that significant differences exist between family firms where the family grows more than the company and those where the company grows more than the family. Each group has a different vision. The former is more oriented towards meeting their family needs through the company, whereas the latter is more oriented towards business and professional efficiency.

One of the limitations arises from the fact that the question concerning the rate of growth of the company and the family is a “self‐reported” question that can lead to bias due to the subjective perception of growth. Other limitations arise from the cross‐cutting and exploratory nature of the research.

This paper analyses the differences between family firms where the family grows more than the company and those where the company grows more than the family.

The purpose of this paper is to gain insight into the features that the business structure known as a Family Office (FO) has in Spain by considering it as a useful tool for businessmen to manage and/or diversify their wealth. After reviewing the available literature, the authors put forward a model for the constitution of an FO in terms of a system of interdependent variables which prove useful in making sense of the different forms in which Spanish FOs are organized, governed and, ultimately, evolve.

The authors employed a case study method, selecting a sample of six Spanish FOs, being careful in that they stand for each of the different types of FO that have been distinguished in the literature. This research method is appropriate insofar as the notion of degree of development – even though it is acknowledged that applies in the business practice – has not been properly understood yet to the point that sound conceptual grounds for its study can be established.

We have identified and discerned among three variables which prove useful in understanding the constitution and development processes of an FO, namely: objectives‐scope of activity; structure‐outsource to in‐house ratio; and governance bodies. The relation between these variables and the development of an FO can be made manifest in terms of three propositions of a heuristic nature based on this case study. The authors can explain the relation between these variables and the degree of development of an FO in this way, and with it contribute foundational elements for the development of a theoretic framework that is appropriate for pursuing further research on the factors that can enhance the performance of an FO.

The companies that have been sampled in this case study, even though complying with the significance criteria in a case study scenario, do not comprise the totality of operating Spanish FOs. Thus, in spite of the adequacy of this method, the results obtained cannot be extended as they are to the entire population of Spanish FOs. Nonetheless, they are helpful in suggesting a theoretic framework for a subsequent statistical study that can either reinforce or weaken the theoretic elements suggested.

Given the small‐sized deployment of the FO in Spain – about only ten per cent of those located in Europe – it seems important to make available to family firms what the main motivations and rationale for setting an FO may be, together with the best conditions to proceed doing so, thus expanding their knowledge on what the most appropriate structures and governance bodies are and what the consequences of the decisions taken in those regards may be.

A number of studies, most of them conducted by America‐based researchers, have been conducted in the recent past, with the aim of analyzing the deployment of FOs and the consequences for the entrepreneur family. Nonetheless, given the relatively recent constitution of this kind of structure, the number of studies devoted to it is still comparatively scarce. This is even more significant when it comes to the study of Spanish firms. Hence, this study impinges not only on the improvement of our understanding in terms appropriate for suggesting – and with further research, maybe establishing – a theoretic framework needed for any general study, but also on the optimization of the FO management.