8. Conclusions, limitations and future developments
In this study we examined to what extent High Performance Work Practices (HPWPs) contribute to the retention of valuable employees in family versus non-family firms and in different situations of family influence. Overall the results indicate that: (a) the family firm status and the conditions strengthening the family influence on the firm have a positive impact on retention; (b) in the presence of HPWPs, the “family effect” combines with the formal practices to produce a positive influence on retention; and (c) some of the outcomes of the family influence and of the adoption of formal practices may be so similar that they produce substitution effects on retention. With this research we add to the knowledge on human resource practices in family firms, a topic that is still in its infancy in the family business studies (Cruz et al., 2011), and in particular, as explained above, we shed new light on the contrasting arguments regarding HRM practices targeted at non-family employees. We also contribute to the social exchange perspective in the study of family firms and to the HRM literature concerning the ways HRM practices interact. Our study may suggest several issues for future research. First of all, we measured the intensity of use of HPWPs, but we make only conjectures about the use of informal and relational practices, assuming that a lower adoption of HPWPs corresponds to an higher reliance on social mechanisms. Future research should directly identify the informal dimensions of human resource management practices that leverage on family social capital.
