How to reduce turnover intentions in the family business: Managing centripetal and centrifugal forces

Dmitry Khanin

Business Horizons, 2013, vol. 56, issue 1, 63-73

Abstract: Turnover intentions refer to the anticipation of leaving one's job. If realized, turnover intentions may result in loss of human talent and leakage of firm know-how to competitors. This article analyzes the causes and intensity of turnover intentions by contrasting two divergent forces. The first force is centripetal; it draws employees into an organization and makes alternatives less attractive. The second force is centrifugal; it makes the existing job less attractive compared to alternatives. This article argues that various combinations of centripetal and centrifugal forces can be observed in four distinct areas: the time-bomb, ineptitude, tug-of-war, and best-of-both-worlds ‘turnover zones.’ Respectively, the emergence and intensity of turnover intentions in each turnover zone is distinct. Thus, an interesting question to examine is: How do centripetal and centrifugal forces play out in the family business? Applying this analysis to a family firm operating in the western part of the United States helps explain the reasons family employees may or may not form turnover intentions, as well as such intentions’ relative intensity. This article argues that person-job fit and family embeddedness, which are observed when an employee shares the founder's vision and the integrated values of the family and family business, help reduce turnover intentions. To succeed, however, family firms must also urge inept employees to form turnover intentions.

Keywords: Family business; Turnover intentions; Centripetal forces; Centrifugal forces; Family embeddedness; Organizational commitment; Person-job (PJ) fit; Alternative employment opportunities (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0007681312001243
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:bushor:v:56:y:2013:i:1:p:63-73

DOI: 10.1016/j.bushor.2012.09.005

Access Statistics for this article

Business Horizons is currently edited by C. M. Dalton

More articles in Business Horizons from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().