| More than 70% of small and medium-sized enterprises fail the survival of succession from founder to the next generation of business ownership. Inadequate attention to management policies and strategies have been known to be responsible for the success and failure of the business. There is little knowledge on the aspect of the phenomenon of Founder-syndrome, a leadership control behavior adversely affecting the organization. Founder-syndrome reflects the authoritative, disproportionate influence and control a founder imposes on managing the organization. The general business problem of the study is that founders are often skillful in creating businesses but are not, however, aware of the time to step aside after successful stewardship and hand over control of the leadership to a suitable incumbent. The purpose of this collective explanatory case study was to explore how founders of SMEs in a county in Maryland managed their exit from the organization after successful stewardship. Data from 11 business founders was analyzed to address the research questions of the study. The following 11 themes originated from the review of literature on SMEs: (a) founder's activity through adversities, (b) aspirations to become a business owner, (c) education influencing business leadership, (d) circumstances leading to founding of the business, (e) employing legitimate power to fulfill business goals, (f) founder's management expertise, (g) preparation of succession planning, (h) culture of the organization, (i) founder's desire to be involved in the organization after retirement, (j) founder's willingness to share vision with organizational members, and (j) factors contributing to founder's success. |
