Seminar #25 – September 15, 2021

ABSTRACT – Integrating a socio-emotional wealth lens with gender role theory, we examine gender inequality between siblings in the appointment to the CEO position within a family business and the firm performance following the appointment of a daughter versus a son to the CEO position. Data from a sample of about 20,000 family firms in Sweden support our argument that daughters are less likely than sons to be appointed to the CEO position. However, this effect is weaker in family firms where the mother holds the CEO position. Furthermore, family firms that appoint daughters to the CEO position outperform family firms that appoint sons. Our findings reveal an important gendered dimension of the succession in family firms—sons are favored, but daughters do better.