Ownership, Governance, Management and Firm Performance: Evidence from Italian Firms

Audinga Baltrunaite, Sara Formai (), Andrea Linarello and Sauro Mocetti
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Sara Formai: Bank of Italy

No 678, Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) from Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area

Abstract: We explore the role of ownership, governance and management characteristics as potential drivers of the performance gaps between firms located in the Centre and North and in the South of Italy. First, we document that southern firms are characterized by more frequent family ownership and a higher fraction of local and family directors on the board. Moreover, entrepreneurs and managers of southern firms have lower education levels and are less inclined to adopt structured managerial practices and advanced technology. Second, we examine to what extent these differences account for the performance gap between the two areas. We find that managers’ human capital explains one tenth of the difference in firm size, while family ownership accounts for one tenth of the differences in productivity. Although the analysis is purely descriptive, our findings suggest that ownership, governance and management play a significant role in explaining firm performance and account for a non-negligible fraction of the North-South divide.

Keywords: ownership; family firms; corporate governance; managerial practices; human capital; firm size; productivity; technology (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: G30 L20 M10 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-bec, nep-cfn, nep-cse, nep-eff, nep-ent, nep-hrm and nep-sbm
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Journal Article: Ownership, Governance, Management and Firm Performance: Evidence from Italian Firms (2024)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bdi:opques:qef_678_22

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