Managerial capabilities in the family tourist business : is professionalization the key to their development?

The main objective of this paper is to analyze the elements of the particular governance structure of the family business and the involvement of the family in the business in order to verify its effects on managerial capabilities. Likewise, professionalization in this type of company will be studied as a moderating variable. To address this analysis, the Resource and Capabilities Based-View and the Agency Theory will be taken as a basis. The empirical study is carried out on a base of 591 Spanish tourism companies using a multiple linear regression analysis. The results show that many of the peculiar characteristics of the family business have a negative effect on their managerial skills, preventing their proper development. However, the professionalization of the maximum responsible of the family business would contribute to alleviating these problems, facilitating the development of the said skills in the family business.