Limits to the Growth of Family-Owned Business? The Case of Chinese Transnational Corporations from Hong Kong
通过三个香港华人家族企业的案例，研究国际化如何帮助家族企业突破管理局限、实现增长，对研究家族企业国际化管理的学者有参考价值。
It has become conventional wisdom in management literature that family-owned business is restricted by its management practices and, therefore, cannot grow beyond a certain size. In the case of Chinese family firms, these practices are related to paternalism, nepotism, personalism, and fragmentation. This paper examines three detailed qualitative case studies of Chinese family firms from Hong Kong that have relentlessly pursued growth through internationalization. It argues that venturing into foreign markets and transnational operations has become an effective means for Chinese family firms to expand beyond the limits of domestic markets and centripetal management structures. International business strategies enable Chinese family firms to socialize trusted members into the corporate “family,” provide a training ground for the future heir to the patriarch, and consolidate networks of personal and business relationships. There are, therefore, no a priori reasons to support the alleged limits to the growth of Chinese family firms in their international context.