On the Goals of Successful Family Companies

Providing clear goals for a company and communicating them are among the most powerful means for guiding the behavior of the people in an organization. In this article, we explore the range of objectives or goals of family-owned and -managed companies and identify those most commonly regarded as important by owner-managers. Further, we describe six major empirical dimensions of goals that we derived by factor-analytic procedures. Finally, we suggest how researchers, managers, and consultants can use our work to help owner-managers clarify and communicate their goals.