Impact of TMT structural power asymmetry on family firm internationalization
Abstract
We examine the impact of the top management team’s (TMT) structural power asymmetry on a family firm’s
degree of internationalization. Structural power is the administrative power drawn from formal positions and is
different from ownership power. We argue that family identity creates a faultline between the family and nonfamily managers in the family firm’s TMT. This faultline gets strengthened when the family managers skew
‘structural power’ toward themselves (termed as ‘family structural power concentration’), leading to poor team
integration and cooperation among family and non-family managers. Resultantly, family firms are unable to
leverage the knowledge, expertise, and network of the non-family managers in the firm’s TMT for the firm’s
internationalization attempts. We hypothesize a negative relationship between ‘family structural power concentration’ and the ‘firm’s degree of internationalization’. Further, we argue that this relationship is moderated by
environmental dynamism and competitive intensity. Our findings have implications for research and practice.
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