Title: Innovation in family and non-family businesses: a resource perspective

Authors: Josep Llach, Mattias Nordqvist

Addresses: Department of Business Administration and Product Design, University of Girona, 17071 Girona, Spain. ' Jonkoping International Business School, Centre for Family Enterprise and Ownership, SE-551-11-Jonkoping, Sweden

Abstract: This article expands our understanding regarding the differences in innovative behaviour between family and non-family firms. To detect real rather than sample differences between independent family and non-family manufacturing companies in Spain, we use a matched sample methodology with data from the European Manufacturing Survey – a European cross-national survey launched in 11 countries and focused on the manufacturing sector. A Mann-Whitney U non-parametric test revealed that six out of seven measures were statistically significant between the two matched groups of companies. We found differences between family and non-family firms with regard to the role of human, social and marketing capital for innovation. These findings are of interest because some of them run contrary to conventional thinking that family firms are less innovative than non-family firms.

Keywords: innovation; human capital; social capital; marketing capital; non-family businesses; family businesses; innovative behaviour; manufacturing companies; Spain; European Manufacturing Survey; Mann-Whitney U test; non-parametric tests; statistical significance; entrepreneurial venturing; business ventures; entrepreneurs; entrepreneurship; entrepreneurialism; family firms.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEV.2010.037119

International Journal of Entrepreneurial Venturing, 2010 Vol.2 No.3/4, pp.381 - 399

Published online: 25 Nov 2010 *

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