19425: Through the Looking Glass: Managing Family Enterprise Culture (session 26122)

Sunday, July 27, 2025

10:15 - 11:45 CEST (GMT+2)

Location: Bella Center: Hall B- B2-m4

Session Type: Paper Session
Orientation: Research
Shareable link: https://cdmcd.co/zEAdQk

Author(s)

ET

Elizabeth Tetzlaff

Dalhousie University, Canada
PJ

Peter Jaskiewicz

Telfer School of Management, U. of Ottawa, Canada
SB

Sarah Burrows

Smith School of Business, Queen's U., Canada
JC

Jim Combs

University of Central Florida, United States

While the importance of organizational culture is well accepted, little is known about how to change it, and the challenge of cultural change is even more difficult when a family owns the business. We conducted a multiple case study investigation of ten multigenerational family businesses, interviewing family and non-family leaders, to identify the underlying processes that family leaders use to change organizational culture, and how these processes influence firm outcomes. We introduce a process model showing how family leaders change their organizational culture through processes of switching, filtering, and defending in response to triggers emerging from problems and revised goals. These findings have important implications for understanding when integrating the family within the family enterprise culture can be an asset or a liability.

view paper (if available)