Emerging Family Firms: Leadership and Entrepreneurship

Dear Colleagues,

Family firms remain central actors in the global economy, particularly in shaping the entrepreneurial landscape. However, much remains to be explored about how leadership and entrepreneurship co-evolve in these complex, dynamic organizational forms. This Special Issue of Administrative Sciences, titled ‘Emerging Family Firms: Leadership and Entrepreneurship’, seeks to advance our scholarly understanding of the unique ways leadership and entrepreneurial practices emerge, evolve, and interact within family-owned businesses.

This Special Issue focuses on the interrelationship between leadership and entrepreneurship in emerging or evolving family firms. It will explore how these dual engines drive innovation, strategic renewal, transgenerational continuity, and business model transformation in contexts of uncertainty, generational transitions, or external shocks.

We welcome conceptual and empirical contributions that examine leadership and entrepreneurial behaviour in family businesses across different stages of development, ownership structures, cultures, and industries. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following: entrepreneurial orientation in family firms; leadership succession and innovation; strategic renewal and family governance; intrapreneurship and the role of next-generation leaders; and the influence of socioemotional wealth on entrepreneurial and leadership decisions.

The purpose of this Special Issue is to showcase theoretical and practical insights into how leadership and entrepreneurship uniquely manifest in family business contexts and how these processes contribute to business resilience, adaptability, and sustainable value creation.

While there is a growing body of literature that examines family business, entrepreneurship, and leadership separately, there is limited integrated research exploring the interplay of these dimensions within emerging family firms. This Special Issue aims to fill this gap by encouraging interdisciplinary perspectives and novel methodological approaches. It builds on prior work emphasizing the uniqueness of leadership development in family enterprises (Le Breton-Miller et al., 2011), the entrepreneurial paradox in preserving tradition while pursuing innovation (Zellweger et al., 2013), and the influence of family dynamics on strategic decision-making (De Massis et al., 2018). It also draws on more recent insights regarding entrepreneurial legacy (Jaskiewicz et al., 2015) and the microfoundations of leadership and innovation in family firms (Cruz et al., 2021). By focusing on emerging firms and emerging forms of leadership and entrepreneurship, this Special Issue will provide fresh insights and practical implications for scholars and practitioners navigating the evolving landscape of family business.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Entrepreneurial orientation and innovation in family firms;
• Leadership succession and generational transition;
• Intrapreneurship and the role of next-generation family members;
• Strategic renewal and transformation in family businesses;
• Family governance and entrepreneurial decision-making;
• Socioemotional wealth and leadership dynamics;
• Family firm resilience during crises or uncertainty;
• Female leadership and gender roles in family entrepreneurship;
• Organizational identity and long-term value creation;
• Emerging markets and cultural contexts in family entrepreneurship.

Submission Instructions:

We request that, prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 200–500 words summarizing their intended contribution. Please send it to the guest editors (ovidiu.bordean@econ.ubbcluj.ro) or to the Assistant Editor of Administrative Sciences (zoya.zhang@mdpi.com). Abstracts will be reviewed by the guest editors for the purposes of ensuring proper fit within the scope of the Special Issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer-review.

Abstract Submission Deadline: 31 May 2026

Notification of Abstract Acceptance: 30 June 2026

References

Cruz, A. D., Hamilton, E., & Jack, S. L. (2012). Understanding entrepreneurial cultures in family businesses: A study of family entrepreneurial teams in Honduras. Journal of Family Business Strategy, 3(3), 147–161.

De Massis, A., Kotlar, J., Wright, M., & Kellermanns, F. (2018). Sector-based entrepreneurial capabilities and the promise of family firms. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 42(6), 1241–1251.

Gómez-Mejía, L. R., Haynes, K. T., Núñez-Nickel, M., Jacobson, K. J. L., & Moyano-Fuentes, J. (2007). Socioemotional wealth and business risks in family-controlled firms: Evidence from Spanish olive oil mills. Administrative Science Quarterly, 52(1), 106–137.

Jaskiewicz, P., Combs, J. G., & Rau, S. B. (2015). Entrepreneurial legacy: Toward a theory of how some family firms nurture transgenerational entrepreneurship. Journal of Business Venturing, 30(1), 29–49.

Le Breton-Miller, I., Miller, D., & Steier, L. (2011). Toward an integrative model of effective FOB succession. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 35(6), 1225–1250.

Zellweger, T. M., Nason, R. S., Nordqvist, M., & Brush, C. G. (2013). Why do family firms strive for nonfinancial goals? An organizational identity perspective. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 37(2), 229–248.

Dr. Ovidiu Bordean
Dr. Hamza Nidaazzi
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Administrative Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• family firms
• family business
• entrepreneurship
• entrepreneurial orientation
• leadership
• succession
• socioemotional wealth
• governance
• innovation
• strategic renewal