Bifurcation bias and exporting: Can foreign work experience be an answer? Insight from European family SMEs

We develop hypotheses from a “bifurcation bias” approach involving the asymmetric treatment of family and nonfamily assets, and we test them on a sample of 6893 European family SMEs. Our findings reveal two asymmetries relating to actions designed to reduce bifurcation bias. First, exporting is indeed positively associated with the presence of outside owners and managers, and from the interaction between them. However, this interaction replaces any separate positive impact from outside ownership. Second, the international work experience of managers has a positive impact on exporting, but this experience seems relevant only in the case of firms with family-managers only.