The Ties That Bind: Exploring relationship-oriented values in family firms from employees' perspective

The importance of a family firm's specific culture has been widely discussed in family business research. The interplay between family and business gives rise to values that underlie the culture of such firms. Although family business research is centrally concerned with these values, the ensuing analysis is often limited to the perspective of founders or family members and ignores the employees' views. Thus, this paper enlarges existing family business research by examining characteristic, albeit under-investigated, element of a firm's culture: its relationship-oriented values from an employees' perspective. To this end, the study considered a sample of 312 employees from 15 family firms in Germany. Using factor analyses, the paper examined and confirmed that, from an employee's perspective, relationship-oriented values serve as a discrete and crucial value dimension for characterizing a family firm's culture. To ensure predictive validity, the study utilized multiple regression analysis to measure effects on two performance criteria: affective commitment and trust in management. The results confirm a strong effect of relationship-oriented values on said criteria. These findings underline the positive impact that relationship-oriented values exert on family firms' performance. The paper also provides a differentiated four-factor value inventory for analyzing a family firm's culture.