Global family enterprise expert Prof Pramodita Sharma visited Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University this week as a guest of the NMMU Family Business Unit. Professor Sharma is the Sanders Professor of Entrepreneurship and Family Business at the University of Vermont in the USA, and the Global Director of the Successful Transgenerational Entrepreneurship Practices (STEP) project, Babson College, as well as the Editor-in-Chief of Family Business Review.
NMMU through the NMMU Family Business Unit is the first African university to become an affiliate of the global STEP project. The project involves rigorous qualitative and quantitative research. Active dissemination of evidence based knowledge is done through summits with families and publications.
For the last seven years, over 200 scholars from 44 universities around the globe have been engaged in STEP for Family Enterprising convened by Babson College. Using a multiple-methods approach, this global applied research initiative explores the entrepreneurial process within business families and generates solutions that have immediate application for family leaders.
According to Prof Sharma, “with 44 institutions and almost 200 scholars involved in a co-ordinated investigation of factors important for transgenerational entrepreneurship in family enterprises, the STEP project is extremely important in its uniqueness as a global applied research project. To co-create knowledge, STEP scholars and families have held 12 summits around the world, since STEPs inception in 2005.”
The first case study conducted by the NMMU Family Business Unit, under the leadership of Profs Elmarie Venter and Shelley Farrington, was with the family members of the well-known Tavcor Motor Group. The family managed Volkswagen, Audi and Suzuki Dealership Group operate mainly in Port Elizabeth and George. The business started in 1950 as one of the first VW dealerships in South Africa and has focused its attention on a narrowly defined area – the Eastern & South Western Cape.
“Over the years, the Tavcor Motor Group has been known for its pioneering approaches to how they do their business and this resulted in unbeatable value for their customers. This made this family business an ideal candidate for the first case study on family businesses,” says Prof Venter.
Established in 2005, STEP is a collaborative research initiative that aims to understand how successful long lived family firms ignite entrepreneurial thought and action across generations. STEP explores the important questions related to sources that enable continuous innovations to create new streams of wealth and value across generations.
STEP scholars and families join together to:
Conduct cutting edge research on the entrepreneurial capabilities and contributions of business families worldwide
Generate an applied stream of powerful and pragmatic entrepreneurial practices that fuel continuity and growth of family enterprises
Provide a shared learning environment where researchers interact with family business leaders to generate solutions that have an immediate impact.
Alan Straton
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