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Is Blood Thicker Than Water? A Study of Stewardship Perceptions in Family Business

James H. Davis¹; Mathew R. Allen²; H. David Hayes²

¹ University of Notre Dame, Mendoza College of Business, Notre Dame, IN, USA. · ² Northeastern University, College of Business Administration, Boston, MA, USA.

Stewardship theory has been used to explain the culture and relationships within family businesses. Researchers have also demonstrated that stewardship leads to superior family business performance. To date, few empirical analyses have examined the situational mechanisms associated with stewardship in family business. This paper examines the role of the family in explaining stewardship within a family business, including the role of trust, value commitment, and agency. We find that value commitment, trust, and agency perceptions explain a significant portion of stewardship variance for family and nonfamily business employees. We further find that family member employees perceive significantly higher value commitment, trust, and stewardship perceptions and lower agency perceptions in family firm leadership than nonfamily members, suggesting that blood is indeed thicker than water.

DOI

10.1111/j.1540-6520.2010.00415.x

Volume

34 (6)

Pages

1093-1116

Language

en

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