Introducing the enterpriseness of business families: A research agenda

The paper describes a research agenda for business families. The family has received little attention in family business research. Business families are faced with demands from family and business, which need to be managed in a way that neither the family nor the business is discriminated in the long run. Business families develop “enterpriseness” by accepting business-related rules. The enterpriseness of business families captures the business’ influence on the family and deals with the potential liability of complexity of business families. Based on the dimensions involvement, essence and identity enterpriseness is conceptualized and a set of fundamental research questions is developed.