Socialization Patterns of Successors in First- to Second-Generation Family Businesses

This paper focuses on the socialization of potential successors in family business and attempts to relate this process to values that founders intend to convey to the next generation. We found that founders' values condition potential successors' socialization and that there are two different phases common to all socialization processes. The first stage, characterized by family socialization and common to all founders' descendants, comprises value transmission and training. The second stage is characterized by business socialization and reserved only for the founder's potential successors. We also identified two models of socialization that pursue two different aims: (a) the Founder Homosocial Reproduction Model and (b) the New Leader Development Model. These socialization models are consistent not only with values that the founder intends to convey to potential successors but also with the founder's own business perception. We present and explain the distribution of these two models according to each group of founders. Finally, we reveal the content of what we call the founder's dependence paradox and the effect on the next-generation socialization process. © 2002, SAGE Publications. All rights reserved.