Entrepreneurial Intentions of the Progeny of Family Businesses

The study attempted to learn the intentions of the progeny of the business families to join their existing family firms. The paper analyzes the constructs that play a major role in their decision. The potential impact of demographic variables like age, gender, nature of family business and community are also analyzed. A structured questionnaire was administered to 203 graduate and post graduate students of business family studying business management course in select B schools in the city of Hyderabad. The questionnaire consisted of 35 questions with intention to join (ITJ) as dependent variable while family pressure (FP), risk taking propensity (RTP), autonomy(A), self-esteem (SE), orientation towards work (OTW), individual social responsibility (ISR), authority (Au), synergy (Sy) and pro-active personality (PP) being independent variables. A 5-point Likert scale from strongly agree to strongly disagree was used. The study found statistically significant association of gender, community, likely successor and successor with the dependent variable. However, no association was established between age, nature of business, primogeniture and level of education with the intention to join family business. Out of nine independent variables, only four variables (family pressure, self-esteem, orientation towards work, and individual social responsibility) were found to be making a meaningful impact on the dependent variable.