More Bang for Their Buck: Why (and When) Family Firms Better Leverage Corporate Social Responsibility

Abstract

Family firms take different strategic actions because of their desire to grow and preserve socioemotional wealth (SEW), but pursuing SEW also generates what we call SEW resources that deliver advantages in certain contexts. We develop and test this idea with respect to corporate social responsibility (CSR). We theorize that SEW resources such as reputation, strong stakeholder relationships, and long-term orientation help family firms better leverage symbolic CSR to enhance short-term firm performance and better leverage substantive CSR to enhance long-term firm performance. Regression analyses on a 20-year panel of S&P 500 firms provide supportive evidence. Findings indicate that family firms not only “do it differently” to preserve SEW; they sometimes “do it better” because of SEW.