Purpose - Families are becoming increasingly diverse; however, this development is only partially reflected in the family business literature. The majority of the existing research still draws on assumptions aligned with traditional family structures and therefore, may not fully capture the contemporary dynamics of business families. These developments change the mechanisms through which families influence ownership distribution, managerial roles and the family business lifecycle. Design/methodology/approach - We apply the theory adaptation perspective by Jaakkola (2020), problematizing the assumptions of a core family that shape both the three-circle model and the lifecycle model. Drawing on family science, family business and entrepreneurship theories, we illustrate multilevel shifts that shape the zeitgeist of business families, broadening the conceptual scope of the two frameworks to better capture such timely developments. Findings - First, we adapt the three-circle model (Tagiuri and Davis, 1996) by integrating a multilevel framework that specifies the mechanisms through which contemporary family structures reshape ownership, management and the business family. Second, we propose two additional tiers that extend the lifecycle framework of Gersick et al. (1999): the Contemporary perspective and the Frontiers perspective. Together, these two tiers preserve the strengths of the classic model while providing an update to the conceptual baseline for the analyses of family businesses. Originality/value - Current family business literature concentrating on the business family mainly assumes the business family has a stable core family structure. This paper adapts both the three-circle model and the lifecycle framework to encompass contemporary family realities and specifies how they reshape development across business, ownership and the business family.

In contrast to internal family succession, changes in ownership to nonfamily successors often mean that owners of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) request a selling price. However, SME owners often subconsciously determine a first-offer price based on personal experiences and emotions with their firms. If the first-offer price deviates from the firm's earnings value, company transactions likely fail. Research examines few emotional aspects of the first-offer price and lacks a measurement scale to quantify their influence. We develop this scale, the individual price indicator. The scale consolidates the emotional aspects from the literature based on 136 peer-reviewed articles and validates them in two qualitative studies (n = 4, n = 48) and two quantitative studies (n = 48, n = 495). This paper further offers a preliminary test of the new scale. In addition to owners of SMEs, the scale also helps successors, advisors, and other parties reflect on the owner's rationale for a first-offer price.

This research offers practical insights into the emotional factors that small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) owners consider when setting a selling price for their business when transferring ownership to nonfamily successors. Many SME owners rely on their personal experiences and emotions to determine the initial offer price, which can often lead to failed transactions if the price expectation does not reflect the true value of the business. However, existing research on this topic is limited, and there is no standardized measurement scale to quantify the impact of emotional factors on the first-offer price. This article introduces a newly developed hands-on scale and explains its use for practitioners such as SME owners, successors, advisors, and other parties to reflect on the owner's emotional motivations for setting the initial offer price.

The subject of business succession is of high economic significance. However, the market of business succession is non-transparent and there are only few quantitative empirical analyses. This study is concerned with the acquisition and divestment of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the context of business succession in Germany. It focuses on the characteristics and motives of the parties involved in buying and selling SMEs - an area that has so far been subject to little research. In order to answer these research questions, this study empirically analyses and evaluates 5,993 user data of the SME calculator (German KMUrechner), an online tool to evaluate SMEs. This study contributes to research on business succession and thus supports politicians, professional associations and organizations in the development of consulting services in practice.

Planning for business succession is a challenging process. For non-family successors, small family firm owners typically demand a sale price, which they specify based on personal experiences with a...

This study examines the influence of individual owner-manager values on the different dimensions of socioemotional wealth in family firms. We argue that values of owner-managers in family firms are one of the underlying motivators for socioemotional wealth behavior and used structural equation modeling to test the assumed connection. The results of our data set with 1,003 cases show, in accordance with Schwartz's value dimensions, that social- and person-oriented values influence different dimensions of the FIBER scale. Our findings help understand the importance of individual values, advance socioemotional wealth research, and contribute to the understanding of family firm behavior.