Title: Relationship between market orientation and performance in family owned firms: a context-specific investigation

Authors: Ram Subramanian, Pradeep Gopalakrishna

Addresses: School of Business, Montclair State University, Montclair, NJ 07043, USA. ' Lubin School of Business, Pace University, NY, USA

Abstract: Market orientation has been found to be an important factor in how firms respond to environmental changes. This study reports on the market orientation of family firms using survey data of 368 firms. A high score on market orientation was strongly related to improved performance, measured in terms of increase in overall revenues, return on capital and profit margin. While size was not a factor in the ability to becoming market oriented, family firms| organisational type was found to have an effect on the overall revenue performance measure. The implications of these findings to the academic literature on family firms and the management of family owned firms are discussed.

Keywords: family businesses; market orientation; organisational performance; strategic planning; family firms; revenue; return on capital; ROI; profit margin.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBIR.2009.027174

International Journal of Business Innovation and Research, 2009 Vol.3 No.5, pp.500 - 514

Published online: 17 Jul 2009 *

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