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PurposeThe purpose of this article is to provide a comprehensive understanding of the roots of family firms' competitive advantages by defining and testing the familiness learning mechanisms that emerge from the interaction between family and firm. Because family members are economically, emotionally and socially attached to the firm, family firms are expected to be able to develop unique and difficult to imitate learning mechanisms related to family firm value creation.Design/methodology/approachThis study operationalizes and tests the concept of the familiness learning mechanism using a sample of nonlisted Spanish family firms. The sample is analyzed using the structural equation modeling method.FindingsResults show that family firms' ability to accumulate internal and external knowledge, integrate social knowledge, as well as create and retain socioemotional knowledge forms the concept of the familiness learning mechanism, and the authors show what implications it might have for family firm value creation.Originality/valueBy using the dynamic capabilities approach, this article highlights the importance of the knowledge and learning derived from family involvement in the firm. The creation of learning mechanisms occurs because of the close relationships between family members and their simultaneous participation in the family and in the company systems, which creates a unique context wherein knowledge and learning emerge in an idiosyncratic manner.

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The socioemotional wealth (SEW) related to emotional endowments accumulated in the business by the family, is one of the most important features that differentiate the family firms of other organizations. However, there are few studies developed in the context of the antecedents and consequences of the building and use of SEW in the family business. Therefore, this study, using a sample of Spanish family firms that are non-publicly traded, explains how family influence affects the building and use of SEW and, thus, the organizational effectiveness of the family firm. The results indicate mixed results regarding the impact of the family involvement on the essence. Those suggest a positive relationship between building and use of SEW and organizational effectiveness of the family business.

Previous research emphasizes that the participation of the family in business operations is the source of resources and capabilities that conditions the strategic behavior of the family firm. This influence has been recognized as "familiness." However, this definition is contextualized from static reasoning that ignores the effect of family dynamics on the behavior and value generation of the family-owned business. Prior literature has recognized that the family influence has a dynamic character based on the idiosyncratic process of knowledge management that manifests itself in the company, dynamic familiness. This family capability is shaped by family organizational routines through the family influence and aims to increase its knowledge portfolios for the strategic use of its resources. This chapter addresses the relationship between family influence and the process of learning and knowledge management. The analysis of this relationship allows assessing how family influence can promote the generation of family organizational routines based on knowledge management processes.