Thomas Zellweger
Title
Prof. Dr.
Last Name
Zellweger
First name
Thomas
Email
thomas.zellweger@unisg.ch
ORCID
Phone
+41 71 224 71 00
10 results
Now showing 1 - 10 of 10
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Item type:Publication, Relational embeddedness and firm growth: Comparing spousal and sibling entrepreneursIntegrating relational embeddedness arguments with Penrosean growth theory, we compare the growth of firms run by spousal entrepreneurs with firms run by sibling entrepreneurs. We theorize that trust, identification, and mutual obligations—the three facets of relational embeddedness—are more pronounced in spousal teams than in sibling teams, which provides spousal teams with advantages over sibling teams in generating firm growth. Probing a sample of all private firms in Sweden over a three-year period, we find support for this conjecture. Exploring boundary conditions to this baseline relationship, we also find that firm age weakens the growth advantages of spousal teams over sibling teams and that industry experience heterogeneity within the entrepreneurial team reinforces these growth advantages. These results provide important contributions for research on firm growth, the social embeddedness of firms, entrepreneurship, and family business.Type:journal articleJournal:Organization ScienceVolume:29Issue:2Scopus© Citations 125 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, In the horns of the dilemma: socioemotional wealth, financial wealth and acquisitions in family firmsWe posit that family firms often face a dilemma in their strategic decision making: whether to maintain current socioemotional wealth (SEW) or pursue prospective financial wealth. Applying such a mixed gamble perspective to acquisitions, family owners assess potential acquisitions with regard to their impact on both wealth dimensions. In line with this reasoning, we find that family control implies a general reluctance to acquire, and, when an acquisition happens, a preference for related targets. Because financial and socioemotional viewpoints lead to largely incompatible predictions about the occurrence and relatedness of acquisitions, family firm owners use their firm's vulnerability as a signal. Increased vulnerability leads to a heightened propensity to prioritize financial over SEW problem framing, which is reflected in the acquisition of unrelated targets. Empirical results are supportive of these predictions.Type:journal articleJournal:Journal of ManagementVolume:44Issue:4Scopus© Citations 442 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Are family firms good employers?Family firms employ about 60 percent of the global workforce. While it is widely assumed that they are good employers, data about their conduct is mixed. In this study, we extend stewardship and agency theories to test competing propositions about the impact of family on employment practices using data from 14,961 private Belgian firms over a 19-year period. Higher investments, lower dividend payout, and higher risk tolerance indicate that family firms are better financial stewards of their companies than nonfamily firms. However, family firms are worse organizational stewards than nonfamily firms: They offer lower compensation, invest less in employee training, and exhibit higher voluntary turnover and lower labor productivity. Further, and contrary to earlier research, we find that financial practices in private family firms do not change over time, and that the deleterious influence of family on employment practices rises with both firm age and with heightened family involvement. Together, our findings suggest that a more nuanced understanding of stewardship and agency theory is needed to understand the impact of family on the governance of private firms.Type:journal articleJournal:Academy of Management JournalVolume:61Issue:2Scopus© Citations 252 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Doing more with less: Innovation input and output in family firms(Academy of Management, 2016-08); ; Family firms are often portrayed as an important yet conservative form of organization that is reluctant to invest in innovation; however, at the same time, evidence shows that family firms are still flourishing and that many of the world's most innovative firms are indeed family firms. Our study contributes to disentangling this puzzling effect. We argue that family firms-owing to the family's high level of control over the firm, wealth concentration, and importance of non-financial goals-invest less in innovation but have an increased conversion rate of innovation input into output and, ultimately, a higher innovation output than non-family firms. Empirical evidence from a meta-analysis based on 108 primary studies from 42 countries supports our hypotheses. We further argue and empirically show that the observed effects are even stronger when the CEO of the family firm is a later-generation family member. However, when the CEO of the family firm is the firm's founder, innovation input is higher and, contrary to our initial expectations, innovation output is lower than that in other firms. We further show that the family firm-innovation input/output relationships depend on country-level factors, namely, the level of minority shareholder protection and the education level of the workforce in the country.Type:journal articleJournal:Academy of Management JournalVolume:59Issue:4Scopus© Citations 824 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, When do family firms have an advantage in transitioning economies? Toward a dynamic institution-based viewWe advance a dynamic institution-based view of the firm that extends the theory's current focus on scope of pro-market reforms (degree of market liberalization in a given year) to consider how speed of reforms (rate of market liberalization achieved over time) affects the performance of firms from transitioning economies. Utilizing a sample of public firms from Chinese provinces with varying reform speeds, we find that while scope of reforms positively impacts firm performance, speed of reforms detracts from firm performance. We further find that while family firms have an advantage in gradually reforming provinces, non-family firms have an advantage in rapidly reforming provinces. Thus, we extend the institution-based view across time (speed of reforms) and firms (family vs. non-family firms).Type:journal articleJournal:Strategic Management JournalVolume:36Issue:9DOI:10.1002/smj.2288Scopus© Citations 214 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Turning Agents into Psychological Principals: Aligning Interests of Non-Owners Through Psychological OwnershipPrincipals who delegate tasks to agents face the perennial challenge of overcoming agency problems. We investigate whether feelings of ownership among senior managers in the absence of formal ownership can align agents' interests with those of principals, thus turning agents into psychological principals. Using a moderated mediation model, we find that psychological ownership is positively related to company performance through the mediating effect of individual-level entrepreneurial behaviour. We also find that the effect of psychological ownership on individual-level entrepreneurial behaviour and, ultimately, company performance is weaker for high levels of monitoring compared to low levels. These findings offer important contributions to agency, psychological ownership, and entrepreneurship literatures.Type:journal articleJournal:Journal of Management StudiesVolume:50Issue:3Scopus© Citations 130 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Why Do Family Firms Strive for Nonfinancial Goals? An Organizational Identity PerspectiveThis paper develops an organizational identity based rationale for why family firms strive for nonfinancial goals. We show that the visibility of the family in the firm, the transgenerational sustainability intentions of the family, and the capability of the firm for self-enhancement of the family positively influence the importance of identity fit between family and firm as well as the family's concern for corporate reputation. We suggest that the concern for corporate reputation leads the family to pursue nonfinancial goals to the benefit of nonfamily stakeholders. We also discuss reinforcing feedback loops in these processesType:journal articleJournal:Entrepreneurship Theory & PracticeVolume:37Issue:2Scopus© Citations 649 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Family Control and Family Firm Valuation by Family CEOs : The Importance of Intentions for Transgenerational Control(InformsOnline, 2012-05); Scopus© Citations 734 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, From Longevity of Firms to transgenerational Entrepreneurship of Families : Introducing Family Entrepreneurial OrientationWhile existing research on the longevity of family firms has focused on the survival of firms, this article investigates transgenerational entrepreneurship of families. By building on the transgenerational entrepreneurship research framework, we argue that by shifting from firm to family level of analysis, we gain a deeper understanding of family firms' ability to create value across generations. We find evidence for our argument in that such a level shift reveals extended entrepreneurial activity which is missed when focusing exclusively on the firm level. We introduce and empirically explore the construct of family entrepreneurial orientation (FEO) which may serve as an antecedent to transgenerational value creation by families.Type:journal articleJournal:Family Business ReviewVolume:25Issue:2Scopus© Citations 484 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Should I stay or should I go? Career choice intentions of students with family business backgroundPersonal and motivational patterns of intentional founders have been researched in great depth; however, antecedents to career choices of intentional successors have been conspicuously missing in entrepreneurship research. By drawing on theory of planned behavior, we investigate how intentional founders, successors, and employees differ in terms of locus of control and entrepreneurial self-efficacy as well as independence and innovation motives. We find that transitive likelihood of career intent depends on degree of entrepreneurial self-efficacy and the independence motive. Unexpectedly, we see that high levels of internal locus of control lead to a preference of employment, which challenges traditional entrepreneurship research and suggests that the feasibility of an entrepreneurial career path does not automatically make it desirable. Our findings suggests that students with family business background are pessimistic about being in control, but optimistic about their efficacy to pursue an entrepreneurial careerType:journal articleJournal:Journal of Business VenturingVolume:26Issue:5Scopus© Citations 567