Longitudinal study of small and medium enterprises and family businesses in an emerging market
Márton Gosztonyi
University of Malaya, Malaysia
gosztonyi.marton@gmail.com
Abstract
In our paper, we analysed a longitudinal survey of Hungarian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and family businesses (FBs). We included a nationally representative, repeated cross-sectional (RCS) sample. We sought to analyse and answer the question of which trends can be detected in four segments (ownership structure, revenue, problem perception, and succession), and whether these trends are similar for SMEs and FBs. We used Grow Curve Modelling and Hierarchical Linear Models (GCM-HLM) to analyse the data. Our results shows that the ownership structure describes a different trend in the case of SMEs and FBs: the former shows a negative trend line, while the latter shows a positive trend line. Although, for sales revenue and sales, in the case of detection of problems, the SMEs and the FBs both can be characterised by an increasing trend line, and no change can be detected in the preparation for succession for either SMEs or FBs.
Keywords: longitudinal study; SMEs; family businesses; emerging market; Grow Curve Modelling; Hierarchical Linear Models