Outcomes of family involvement in minority owned family businesses

This article applies the resource based view (RBV) of the firm to examine the role of family involvement in family, minority owned SMEs and its impact on owner, business and family outcomes. Our nationally representative sample encompasses four groups of entrepreneurs: White, African-American, Korean-American and Mexican-American. Findings show significant differences across the four groups in the three measures of family involvement including the proportion of family members employed in the business, degree of family reciprocal altruism toward the business and degree of financial involvement in the business. Family involvement in the business is also shown to impact owner, business and family outcomes differently across the four groups. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

► Ethnic groups differ in the likelihood of employing family members. ► Ethnic groups vary in the degree of family altruism toward the business. ► Ethnic groups differ in degree of financial involvement in the business. ► Higher family employment has a different impact on business outcomes across ethnic groups.