Women in Turkish family businesses: drivers, contributions and challenges

The number and importance of women in family businesses have increased in the recent years. This is reflected in the growing academic and practitioner interest in the topic. In this paper, we have explored the role of women in family business in the context of Turkey by examining the key drivers for their active involvement, their contribution and the challenges they face. The conceptual framework of the article presents key drivers and challenges identified in the extant literature and introduces additional angles on the problematisation of the topic, mainly issues of succession, conflict and balance of work-life relationships. Drawing on empirical material collected through semi-structured interviews with participant Turkish women, we have highlighted importance of cultural dynamics in analysing drivers, contributions and challenges

How does a succession influence investment decisions, credit financing and business performance in small and medium-sized family firms?

We examine the influence of succession in small and medium-sized family businesses by focusing on investment decisions, credit financing, and business performance. Using data on German SMEs, we find that the succession event affects investment behavior negatively before but positively after the transfer takes place when compared to firms without any succession intentions. With respect to performance, we show that firms’ growth rates increase after succession has taken place. Although hypothesized, we find no empirical evidence to suggest that banks tend to reject successors more often than they reject other business owners when deciding to extend credit to firms for investment purposes