Managing the family firm
Subtitle: evidence from CEOs at work
By: Oriana Bandiera, Andrea Prat, Raffaella Sadun
Contributors: Prat, Andrea, author; Sadun, Raffaella, author; Harvard Business School
Series: Working paper / Harvard Business School -- 14-044; Working paper (Harvard Business School) -- 14-044
Publisher: Harvard Business School
Published: 2013
Place of publication: Boston
Language: eng
Number of pages: 30
Description: CEOs affect the performance of the firms they manage, and family CEOs seem to weaken it. Yet little is known about what top executives actually do, and whether it differs by firm ownership. We study CEOs in the Indian manufacturing sector, where family ownership is widespread and the productivity dispersion across firms is substantial. Time use analysis of 356 CEOs of listed firms yields three sets of findings. First, there is substantial variation in the number of hours CEOs devote to work activities, and longer working hours are associated with higher firm productivity, growth, profitability and CEO pay. Second, family CEOs record 8% fewer working hours relative to professional CEOs. The difference in hours worked is more pronounced in low-competition environments and does not seem to be explained by measurement error. Third, difference in differences estimates with respect to the cost of effort, due to weather shocks and popular sport events, reveal that the observed difference between family and professional CEOs is consistent with heterogeneous preferences for work versus leisure. Evidence from six other countries reveals similar findings in economies at different stages of development.
Notes: "December 2013"--Publisher's Web site.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 24-26).