A Research On Succession Of Tacit Knowledge In Family Business Inherited By Daughters

Almost all entrepreneurs are in the pursuit of "evergreen" of family business. But facing with the inevitable fate of "rich for no longer than three generation" every owner of family business are selecting and untiring their heritors cautiously. In our traditional culture system of family business,"primogeniture" rule is always the preference in family business succession, and it has great impacting on all aspects of operation and management in family business. Son inheritance (especially primogeniture) is of course the first choice for most family business owners, but women (daughters) now have more chances to inherit the family business, as the special policy in ninety eighties have caused a special situation for family business-no sons who is the first choice to be successor, but only daughters. Daughter have to (or finally have the opportunity) to operate or even inherit the family business. And with the improving social status of women, daughters now gradually went to the front from back of family business. So the research of daughters who inherit the family business is a new trend. It is necessary to have a deep research of social practice of "women inherit the family business."In resent years, researches on the succession elements gradually became a hot spot among theoretical workers. Scholars have come to realize that the successful succession of family business depend greatly on the unique elements that give a competitive advantages in the transmission of transfer, and the transfer of material resources is often only as a result of a tradition. Whether they can grasp the unique ability and smoothly transfer of to next generation, will directly affect the rise and fall of the "second pioneering" the success or failure of the family business. However, the topic about the "women inheriting the family business" has yet to be discussed. Intergenerational transmission elements of "gender-blind" researches are often based on the background of female inheritance. The different heritage elements between men and women will become an important enlightenment in the practice of "daughter inherits the family business"Because of the necessity and meaning in theory, this research is about to probe into the succession elements in family business inherited be daughters, and the influencing factors of key elements. We expect to give theory guidance for women succession practices, and lay a root for "evergreen" of family businessThis study has four parts.Part1Introduction and literature. In this part, we introduced the background and innovation of this research. Then gave a systematic review of succession elements areas and women leader areas from domestic researches and abroad. As last, we pointed out the research perspective, ideas, and mining innovations of this research.Part2The distinguish of key succession elements. The second part uses the whole process of content analysis to identify the key heritage elements in the background of women succession. As a extension in women succession area from the research pf Dou Junsheng(2008), we adopted the three main elements from this research:entrepreneurs’ tacit knowledge, entrepreneurs’spirit, and social entrepreneurs’ network. Our finding shows:entrepreneurs’spirit comes first, the entrepreneurs’ tacit knowledge second, then followed by entrepreneurs’social network. In the aspect of entrepreneurs’ spirit, the female inheritance and other stakeholders are concerning more about the spirit of adventure and challenge, the professionalism of the culture, but don’t show any interest in the spirit of innovation; in the aspect of entrepreneurs’tacit knowledge, the female inheritance and other stakeholders cares more about the trick knowledge than the mental model.; and in the aspect of entrepreneurs’ network, the female inheritance and other stakeholders are more focusing on relationships intergenerational transfer of internal network rather than external network.Part3Empirical study of influencing factors of implicit knowledge succession. The third part is a empirical research of influencing factors to intergenerational transmission of implicit knowlcdge(tacit knowledge and entrepreneurs’spirit) on the basis of the recognition elements identified in part2. The results show5factors affecting the family business women in the transmission of tacit knowledge transfer: incumbent tradition willingness, incumbent tacit knowledge transfer ability, successor willingness, the incumbent-the successor the relationship between and the personal role identification of the family members.Part4Summary and research prospects. The fourth part is the summarizes discussions of empirical study and recommendations of the way to improve the transmission results of implicit knowledge, and some lack of research as well as future prospects.