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- Bäckvall, Lisa, 1980-
(författare)
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The coexistence of family, ownership, and business : Conceptualizing entanglement and business family ownering
- 2022
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This research engages with the topic of business family ownership through an ethnographically inspired study of business governance-related activities constructed as family members’ business-owning practices relationally and over time. In short, it is about what business families do when owning businesses and how this form of owning can be conceptualized.Corporate governance dominates understandings of ownership and business where ownership is constructed in a particular manner (individualistic, passive, and public) (e.g. La Porta et al., 1999; Robé, 2011). This is also (e.g. Breton-Miller & Miller, 2009; Le Breton-Miller et al., 2011), the theory in use in the family business research field in terms of governance research (e.g. Aguilera & Crespi-Cladera, 2012). Governing in family businesses has also been conceptualized as overlapping spheres of family, ownership, and business/management (Gersick et al., 1997). This study embraces the coexistence of family, ownership, and business/management as entanglement, which is lacking in corporate governance research in general and in family business studies in particular. By extending alternative framings on ownership and family governance (e.g., Brundin et al., 2010; Nordqvist 2016) via firstly an interpretative paradigm and secondly the practice turn, this phenomenon, business family ownership, is thirdly constructed through one of many possible practice theories – social praxeology (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992). This theory contributes to create conditions for a renewed understanding of owning as doing within a family business, relationally and over time. Social praxeology not only directs attention to relationality but also to individual and collective embodiment, where the central concepts are capital, field, habitus, and practical sense. Bourdieu’s social praxeology acknowledges a relational ontology and epistemology in his particular version of structuralism interpretivism. In this study it implies that the first and second order structuers are contructed via a reflective field reading.Therefore, the purpose of this thesis is to explore and construct the coexistence of family, ownership, and business/management through a social praxeology reading and conceptualizing the business family ownership, as done together and over time.An ethnographically inspired study (through interviews, shadowing, and participation in corporate events) of business- and governance-related activities (such as company board meetings, top management meetings, and product development meetings) generates an understanding of the entanglement of family, ownership, and business/management during an ongoing change of CEO in a family business. Drawing upon a structural reading in line with Bourdieu’s social praxeology (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992), four broad business family ownership practices are constructed: the practice of choosing the next CEO, the practice of calculating, the practice of tasting, and the practice of joking. The first empirical chapter is a reading of capital forms and their structure and distribution within the business family (structures of the first order). In this chapter, the construct of family, along with Bourdieu’s assumptions, is introduced. The second empirical chapter is a reading of both first- and second-order structures, where the family habitus concept is combined with the business dimension in the change of CEO. The third empirical chapter is dominated by the reading of the second-order structures, where the practices of counting, tasting, and joking are constructed as business family owning. These business family ownership practices form an understanding of the entangled nature of a particular family business.This study contributes to generating conditions for understanding business family ownership as private, collective, and transgenerational in contrast to the well-entrenched corporate governance view characterized above. Hence it challenges the dominant views of ownership as property rights that emphasize separateness incorporated in the Gersick et al. (1997) model by instead conceptualizing the coexistence of family, ownership, and management/business as entanglement. Towards a distinction through the conceptualization of entanglement, the family and ownership categories are primarily constructed as a collective subjective corpus operating as structuring structures within a business family field. Business family ownering is a way of governing where the body and its sense reproduce and refine the structures in a family business, forming a specific cultural business family capital. Accordingly, with family habitus, owning turns into ownering. Structuring structure with the particularities of an owner family, relationally inhabited by dominated and dominating agents, forms a business family ownership as ownering, characterized by inertia and relationality.
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| 4. |
- Brundin, Ethel, et al.
(författare)
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Family ownership logic: Framing the core characteristics of family businesses
- 2014
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Ingår i: Journal of Management & Organization. - : Cambridge University Press (CUP). - 1833-3672 .- 1839-3527. ; 20:1, s. 6-37
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In this article we show how specific family business logic shapes managerial practices. Based on empirical material from 20 case studies of family ownership governance, our study identifies seven core characteristics of family ownership logic. These include active, visible and persistent ownership with few owners, relatively stable strategic development encompassing multiple ownership goals, autonomy towards capital markets, and a strong identification and emotional bonding with the business. By considering the family business context, we find managerial practices that are prevalent in the majority of businesses around the world and that have implications for ownership research. It is concluded that by taking the logic of ownership into consideration when studying family businesses, researchers in this field can contribute to the growing literature on sociocultural and behavioural factors in corporate governance relations.
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| 6. |
- Helin, Jenny, 1972-
(författare)
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Living moments in family meetings : A process study in the family business context
- 2011
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This dissertation studies meetings from a process perspective. Such an approach, which can be labelled ‘process organisation studies’ is promising in that it directs attention to social processes continuously in the making. The thesis builds on the current development in process organisation studies in two ways. The first centres on an elaboration on key assumptions of approaching organisational life from a process perspective. I here bridge process organisation studies with Bakhtin’s work on dialogue into a dialogical becoming perspective. This perspective calls for a distinct way of understanding processes of becoming which makes it possible to explore meeting practices as situated, emerging and relational world-making activities. The second is a comprehensive processual account based on a collaborative field study with two owner families. Organised meetings held in a family that owns a business (or several) has proved to be of importance for family business longevity in that the family members can help to develop strong family relations and a healthy business. In this setting, where people are dealing with that which is often most important to them in life, such as their identity, work, family relationships and future wealth, a process approach is useful since it helps to understand the emotionally loaded, complex and intertwined issues at stake.What emerges as central in understanding movement and flow is the need to understand the here and now moments in meetings. I refer to these moments as ‘living moments’ as a reminder of the once-occurring, unique and momentary transformation that can take place between people in such encounters. Thus, the living moment is the moment of movement.
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- Leona, Achtenhagen, et al.
(författare)
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How do companies achieve sustained and profitable business growth? : Business models in continuously growing companies
- 2009
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper deals with a fundamental question for managers and policy makers—how do companies manage to achieve sustained and profitable business growth, especially in times of uncertainty? We propose that continuously growing companies manage to dynamically shape, adapt and renew their business models to fuel growth over time. Specifically, informed by the dynamic capabilities and the strategy-as-practiced perspectives, we develop a framework of business models for understanding how, in practice, business models are developed, adjusted, and if necessary, reconfigured in companies displaying successful continuous growth. Using in-depth, longitudinal evidence from a study of 25 companies, we identify five characteristics as crucial to the business models of companies which manage to successfully grow despite an uncertain world. For each characteristic, we identify the underlying dynamic capabilities and core practices, and draw implications for practice and research.
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- Melin, Leif, 1947-, et al.
(författare)
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Creating Value Across Generations in Family-Controlled Businesses : The Role of Family Social Capital
- 2008
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Ingår i: Family Business Review. - 0894-4865 .- 1741-6248. ; 21:3, s. 259-276
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This article explores the processes through which family-controlled businesses (FCBs) access and recombine resources to match the evolving needs of their business activities.We do so by applying the conceptual lens offered by social capital to the comparative study of four FCBs active in traditional competitive arenas. Our data reveal that these firms’ ability to create financial value over generations does not result from possession of some unique resource, nor from higher-level combinative capabilities; rather, these FCBs have systematically created value through their ability to renew and to reshape their social interactions within and outside the controlling family.
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- Tidasen, Christine, 1971-
(författare)
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Att ta över pappas bolag : En studie av affärsförbindelser som triadtransformationer under generationsskiften i familjeföretag
- 2009
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The family firm sector is volatile due to for example challenges associated with management and ownership succession. Family businesses in Sweden, as well as globally, make an important part of the economy. It is well known that successions are critical transition processes for these firms. While this problem has been approached mainly as an internal managerial or financial challenge, this dissertation discusses the social dimensions of how successors transform family firms and especially personal networks during successions. Triads are used to create understanding for succession processes; the successor and the C.E.O. always contribute to triads. The third (wo)man is another family member, a co-worker, or an external actor, frequently a customer. To make sense out of the triad, one must understand the individuals and their relations. Particularly the relation between the C.E.O. and the successor is being analyzed. Further internal and external relations and how they are being transferred and transformed in a triadic context during successions provide a context for the triads and are considered as well. Accounts from four Swedish manufacturing family firms and their business partners show that the C.E.O.’s personal network infiltrates the environment, both internally and externally, and that the successor must earn trustworthiness to be able to transform the companies and the C.E.O.’s network. The trustworthiness seems to be easier to create on an external arena where the C.E.O. is not present. On that arena the successors can build their own platforms from where they can conquer other relations. It appears that the successor first has to show capability of creating their own external business relations before they can transform the existing internal and external network. Successors should also focus on working, for the family business, in new projects that contribute a new competence to the firm. When a family business is transformed identity development is crucial. The “child” must change its identity from being the next generation to be an obvious C.E.O. on own merits. Keywords: family business, succession, trust, relation, triad, network, identity
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