Non‐family CFOs in family businesses: do they fit?

Abstract

Purpose: This article seeks to explore success factors for integrating non-family CFOs in family firms. The integration of non-family CFOs is of great importance to family firms, as the CFO position is often the first management position in family firms for which non-family managers are recruited. Moreover, non-family CFOs can bring in valuable know-how to the family firm and reduce the family firm's financial risk. Design/methodology/approach: The findings of this study are based on a qualitative field study in Austrian family firms. The views of non-family CFOs, family managers, family board members, and non-family CEOs were obtained through semi-structured interviews. Findings: Four larger success factors for non-family CFOs and five for controlling families were derived. The most important factor for non-family CFOs that emerged from the study was that CFOs should be appreciative of the peculiarities of family firms. For controlling families, the results suggest that it is advisable to provide the non-family CFO enough space to effectively conduct their job as well as respect the CFO's views. Practical implications: Both non-family CFOs and controlling families may find the results presented in this article useful for creating a successful integration of non-family CFOs in family firms. The success factors presented should be directly applicable for CFOs and controlling families. Originality/value: This study is the first to investigate success factors for the integration of non-family CFOs into family firms. Moreover, the results of this article may also be useful to the under-researched field of non-family managers in family firms in general.

From Intention to Trust to Behavioral Trust: Trust Building in Family Business Advising

“…Third-party advisors represent an important group of family business external stakeholders and have been found to highly affect cognitive and affective processes within family businesses. On a cognitive basis, which is broadly defined as the internal processing of information related to observable actions (McAllister, 1995), advisors provide knowledge, recommendations (Hiebl, 2013;Reay et al, 2013) and missing information (Michel & Kammerlander, 2015); serve as facilitators in important transitions, such as intergenerational succession (Salvato & Corbetta, 2013); and influence processes, such as facilitating adaptive sensemaking (Strike & Rerup, 2016). On an affective basis, which is defined as the internal processing of emotions related to subtle feelings (McAllister, 1995), third-party advisors use their own feelings and empathy to become attuned to family business members to capture, influence, and facilitate attention (Strike, 2013).…”

KNOWCON 2020. Knowledge on Economics and Management: Conference Proceedings

“…Conflicts between family members are often accompanied by emotions, which, through emotional contagion, may also harm interpersonal relationships with non-family managers. When there are multiple conflicting family factions in the firm, non-family managers may also receive conflicting instructions (Hiebl, 2013). As a result, non-family managers may voluntarily leave the firm.…”

“…The issues of non-family management and family conflict are connected to each other. Escalated family conflicts can make non-family managers leave the firm (Hiebl, 2013), but non-family managers are also often said to act as mediators of family conflicts (Ibrahim et al, 2001). Thus, this paper aims to bridge the two topics and address the issue of the role of non-family managers in family conflict.…”

Los gerentes no familiares en las Pequeñas y Medianas Empresas familiares

“…Sin embargo, solo en los últimos años diferentes estudios académicos (Vandekerkhof, Steijvers, Hendriks y Voordeckers, 2014;Dekker, Lybaert, Steijvers y Depaire, 2015;Hiebl, 2013) han focalizado su atención sobre este grupo de profesionales que desarrollan su trabajo entre el mundo de la empresa y de la familia.…”

“…Algunas veces, las empresas familiares con poca o ninguna experiencia en el proceso de reclutamiento y selección de managers, tienden a focalizar su atención sobre la experiencia profesional del candidato, haciendo énfasis en los antecedentes que posea en el área en el cual la empresa tenga las mayores dificultades, sin tomar en cuenta las posibles diferencias culturales entre ambos, y el proceso de adaptación mutua que se requiere (Hiebl, 2013;Hall y Nordqvist, 2008). Esta situación podría provocar futuras incomprensiones y conflictos entre los managers familiares y aquellos que no lo son (Hall y Nordqvist, 2008).…”