NBA 4720 - Family Enterprise Management and Governance

Spring. 1.5 credits. Student option grading (no audit).

Open to: all undergraduate students. Co-meets with NBA 6720.

M. Tsoutsoura.

Most companies around the world are controlled by their founding families, including more than half of all public corporations in Europe, and more than two thirds of those in Asia. Even in the United States, where ownership dispersion is at its highest, founding families exercise a significant degree of control over more than half of all public corporations. This course explores the challenges and opportunities created by family leadership and ownership. This elective is designed for students who may be involved in family firms and closely held companies in a variety of roles: joining either their own family’s or someone else’s firm, and students who will do business with family firms, consult to them, invest in them, work with them in private wealth management, mergers and acquisitions, banking, consulting etc. Through case studies, lectures, student projects and guest speakers, the course provides students with exposure to the unique finance, governance, and management issues faced by family firms, and ways in which these issues can be addressed. The course provides students with a framework for analyzing how family ownership, control, and management affect value, and whether and how more value can be created for the various stakeholders. The course brings an integrated financial and managerial perspective to the study of family firms focusing on the financial and corporate governance aspects of family control and their managerial implications.