Private-owned companies with multiple owners: the role of the family and responsible ownership

Time of realisation: 2017 – 2019
Financing: GAČR (GA17-10948S)
Description: The main objective of the project is to better understand how behaviours and attitudes of owners contribute to the performance of privately owned (non-traded) companies with more owners and how this relationship is possibly contributed by another economically significant group of owners – family. The research question of the project would be briefly “How do owners significantly influence the behaviour of firms?” And “Is the influence of the owners different between family and non-family firms?”.
The research includes randomly selected companies that meet the following parameters: 1) limited liability company or joint stock company, 2) with at least two owners, 3) with at least 10 employees, 4) established in the Czech Republic, 5) owners with a total 50% – 100% are always Czech individuals. In simple terms: Czech joint-stock companies and limited liability companies with at least two owners and more than 10 employees.

Data collection for research is conducted through telephone inquiry. From each randomly selected target company, you need to talk to your CEO or owner by phone. Data collection runs on two lines. The first line goes through the research company IPSOS s. r. o., which collects the data for us. The second line of data collection is made up by our students.

Most research activities in the field of management are focused on examining the influence of managers / employees and employees, but the owners as such remained a disregarded (social) group. We believe that this project will show what role owners as a social group can play in the companies they own and ultimately how they can strengthen or weaken their competitiveness. In research, we want to analyse which attitudes and behaviours of the owners are important for the company in terms of competitiveness and whether this influence of the owners is different in family and non-family companies. The results of the project will also contribute to a better understanding of corporate governance issues that are not traded on the stock exchange and for which no formal corporate governance structures are required.

Coordinator at UEP: doc. Ing. Jiří Hnilica, Ph.D.
Other participants from the Department of Entrepreneurship: doc. Ing. Mgr. Martin Lukeš, Ph.D.
Research report: