• Home
• Terms and Conditions
• Resources
  • Resource Overview
  • Articles
  • Books
  • Universities
  • Online Resources
  • Family Business Videos
• Calendar
• Research Scholars Program
  • Program Overview
  • Selection Criteria
  • FAQ
• Family Business Profiles
  • Hall of Fame
  • Family Businesses
• About Us
  • Center Synergy
  • History & Activities
  • Staff
• Contact Us

Family Owned Business Institute

• Print
• Site Index
• Contact Us

Research Scholar's Abstracts 2003 - Sid Barton, Glen Kreiner, Chamu Sundaramurthy

Governance in Family Business: Managing Identities and Boundaries
Sid Barton, Glen Kreiner, Chamu Sundaramurthy
2003

This project is interdisciplinary in nature.It draws on major research stems from organizational behavior, corporate strategy, organization theory, psychology, and family business.Such multidisciplinary approaches are often called for in business research, but too rarely conducted.Two of the major literatures the study draws on are governance of family businesses and boundary theory.

Governance of family business: Governing a business entails managing multiple, often competing, goals requiring controls and collaborations.Controls are the machnisms by which owners help ensure that agents (managers and employees) for the interest of the company rather than their own self interests. Collaboration, on the other hand, represents processes through which agents' interests are aligned with those of the organization such that owners and agents work together.Emphasizing either controls of collaboration at the expense of the other can by dysfunctional; thus recognizing and actively balancing these dual needs is a central governance challenge. These dual systems create tension for managers and employees in family businesses.While employees may have a unique work environment that is more personable, risks of experiencing alienation and unfairness associated with being an "outsider" may create conflict, uncertainty, and loss of productivity in the workforce.

Boundary Theory: Boundary theory offers an excellent lens to explore these challenges stemming from the overlap of family and business identities. The theory provides insights on the processes used by individuals and groups to create, maintain and cross physical temporal, emotional, cognitive, and/or relational limits to roles and identities associated with domains of their life (e.g., work and family).As applied to family owned business, boundary theory offers a lens to explore the dynamics between the "family" and "business" identities that inherently coexist in such firms.Identities deriving from family and business can be integrated (thin boundaries) or segmented (thick boundaries) and influence human actions and interpretations of internal and external events.For instance, owner-managers who construct thin boundaries between family and business roles may have access to valuable financial and human capital resources; by they may face considerable conflict evaluating unproductive family employees, exasperating perceptions of "unfairness" among non-family employees.Thick boundaries or segmentation between family and business identities may enable family firms to infuse objectivity in making key strategic decisions such succession, but can potentially diminish the firm's ability to harness relationships.