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Family Business in Italy: a Humanistic Transition of Assets and Values from One Generation to the Next

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Abstract

This paper analyzes the family business as an organizational entity and as a proprietary form useful to transmit personal values and company assets to the next generations. This paper aims to introduce the legal instruments in Italy to transfer family businesses and to evaluate how these are useful for ensuring not only the survival of the company in the market but also that family values and characteristics pass from one generation to the next maintaining a prosocial humanistic management perspective. The legal status of the family business and the fact that most small- and medium-sized companies in Italy are not listed, which considerably affects disclosure obligations and makes it more challenging to get consistent and reliable information at affordable costs, has to date limited research on this model. In recent years, given their growth in size and market share, the strategic potential of family businesses was recognized by both academics and practitioners, giving rise to further study. A primary goal of a family business is to maintain its competitive advantage in the market and pass down its values in the succession line. Hence, one of the most important themes on which scholars focused has been how this process takes place to ensure continuity. This paper argues that the trust and the family pact are both valid legal instruments to this end, albeit with different advantages depending on the circumstances surrounding the succession.

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Notes

  1. 65% to 90% of all business in various nations.

  2. The four ‘civil’ cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude and temperance seek to enhance

    the interconnection between man and its environment: “man changes his environment but then his environment changes his way of conceiving the world”.

  3. It was precisely the Franciscans who developed the concept of price dependent both on the work contained in the product and on its subjective usefulness deriving from the scarcity of the good: the starting point was love, which was very valuable precisely because it was scarce.

  4. For family-owned enterprises, the top three shareholders hold an average of 94% of the company’s entire share capital, with a 70% share held by the founder alone. In over 90% of such companies, the majority of shares is held by a juridical person or a family, while only in 8% of cases are shares owned by another company. Finally, ownership by banks and public bodies is marginal.

  5. This type of business is characteristic of the Italian production system: 47% of companies have between 1 and 9 employees, and Italy is the third European economy in terms of small business. Indeed, almost three quarters of micro-enterprises are controlled by a juridical person or a family as opposed to the 31% of the large ones. (http://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/A-8-2015-0223_IT.pdf).

  6. www.aidaf.it/attivita/studi-e-ricerche/2016.

  7. Depending on the degree of managerial development, companies can be classified as conservative, pragmatic, anticipatory and forward-looking, each with specific characteristics regarding the process of transition. In conservative enterprises, the generational change is difficult because the founder wants to transfer to his successor all the personal and family characteristics. In pragmatic companies, it is driven by conflicting objectives, one of high ‘managerialization’ and the other based on the splitting of the property, which privileges the business vision as opposed to the family one. In start-up companies, low ‘managerialization’ creates stability in the control of the property and facilitates future management. Finally, in forward-looking companies with a high degree of managerial development and stability, the generational shift can be worked out in the best possible way.

  8. Decisions that could also take the form of a company listing on the securities market.

  9. https://www.giacomooberto.com/pattodifamiglia/pattodifamiglia.htm.

  10. It is, however, possible to do so in alternative ways, for example by using a will to leave parts of the estate to the heirs; or exempting company assets from probate actions to enforce statutory inheritance quotas.

  11. Articles 2645-ter cc (https://www.diritto.it/l-articolo-2645-ter-c-c-gli-effetti-del-vincolo-di-destinazione-i-dubbi-interpretativi/).

  12. At a time in which, at least in some cases, they are caught unprepared or are otherwise psychologically vulnerable from their grief.

  13. https://www.ffi.org/

  14. https://www.globaldata.com/

  15. https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-statistical-reports/-/KS-FT-17-004

  16. Indeed, the trust allows them to: maintain efficient family management; regulate management methods; protect the unity of family goods from outside interference; sequester the assets in the trust, which remains immune from the personal business of the trustee.

  17. Meaning direct descendants entitled to inherit. Spouses, siblings, nieces and nephews, domestic partners and other relatives are excluded.

  18. Indeed, it is possible to have a trustee that does not intervene in the management of the business, but the trustor can also attribute a more active role to the trustee, especially if they are afraid that there may not be any descendants capable of taking over the business after their death.

  19. http://www.societabenefit.net/testo-di-legge/

  20. https://www.ipsunsolar.com/we-are-a-b-corp/

  21. Charitas is a term derived from the Latin caritas (benevolence, affection, noun of carus, that is, dear, loved, on imitation of the Greek chàris, that is, grace), but also from the Greek “, ag’p (as it appears in the Greek New Testament), that is, a great selfless, fraternal love. In Catholic theology it is one of the three theological virtues, along with faith and hope (Dizionario 2019).

  22. M. Pirson also makes the distinction between the homo economicus and the Resourceful, Evaluative, Maximizing Model (REMM).

  23. Such as brotherhood, ethnicity, territory, and faith.

  24. Followed by activities where intrinsic motivation plays a prominent role (such as charity, church and arts) and activities that imply a joint effort for a common cause (such as unions, parties, environmental organizations).

  25. https://hbr.org/1976/07/transferring-power-in-the-family-business.

  26. Family members and their employees, parents and children, the family system and the business.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Giovanni Ferri for access to the data and for his help in elaborating on the idea.

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  1. Department of Economics, LUMSA University, Rome, Italy

    Giorgia Nigri &  Riccardo Di Stefano

  2. LUMSA University, Via Pompeo Magno, 22, Rome, Italy

    Giorgia Nigri &  Riccardo Di Stefano

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Nigri, G., Di Stefano, R. Family Business in Italy: a Humanistic Transition of Assets and Values from One Generation to the Next. Humanist Manag J 6, 57–76 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41463-020-00085-8

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