Family and Family Business Influence on Daughters’ Decision to Start a New Venture

Objectives: Drawing on the family entrepreneurship perspective, non-successor daughters who decided to leave their family business and create their own venture are analysed in this paper. The paper aims to answer this research question: How can family and family business influence a daughter’s decision to pursue an independent entrepreneurial career? Prior work: Many scholars have shown that many daughters leave the family business because of barriers that may prevent them from power roles and career opportunities. However, few studies have deeply investigated non-successor daughters. This article aims to investigate the entrepreneurial experiences of daughters who have left the family business and the role played by the family and the business. Approach: A multiple case study was conducted. Empirical data were collected through interviews to eight women entrepreneurs, daughters of small or medium-sized family business owners, who exited their family firm and decided to pursue an entrepreneurial career by starting new ventures. Results: The results show that non-successor daughters form a heterogeneous group, in which women with different experiences and reasons for starting an entrepreneurial career can be identified. Interviews allowed the identification of three metaphors to describe how family and family business influenced daughter's decision to start a new venture: the springboard; the pot of boiling water; not her cup of tea. Implications and value: The results of this paper contribute to a deeper understanding of non-successor daughters, who have not yet been adequately studied either in the family business literature or in studies of female entrepreneurship. This analysis can also contribute to the family entrepreneurship research field. While several studies have been carried out on how families and family businesses can influence its members’ entrepreneurial spirit and behaviour of its members, studies on daughters have been very limited so far.