Corporate governance and family business performance

Family business continuity plans commonly establish a governance structure for the family and for the family business. The purpose of those structures is to improve strategy and control mechanisms of the family business and, to organize the communication and relationship between family owners and business executives. This research focuses on assessing the impact of those structures on family business performance. Specifically, the study assesses the impact a professional board of directors has on a company's performance. The research team selected a set of 22 family businesses. Some of these families have undergone a process of developing a family protocol over the last seven years. The authors captured the relevant information for this research by sending out a survey to each family member and to each non-family director or executive. (C) 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.