Desafios da sucessão na empresa familiar: um estudo de caso sobre a transição da segunda para a terceira geração em uma empresa serralheira cearense

Abstract

Family businesses are present all over the world and are of great importance to the global economy. Many scholars argue that all businesses are founded primarily on a family and thatthey only lose this characteristic after several years. Despite their great importance, family businesses have a great barrier to overcome: succession. This research has asa general objective to identifythe main difficulties in the process of successionin an wood industry located in Fortaleza and to understand the possibilities of overcoming these difficulties. Understanding these difficulties is very important and requires considerable attention from all individuals involved in the process. Ignoring the succession process can be fatal to the company. In order to understand how the structure of a family business works and the different forms of succession, a bibliographical study was made to give a theoretical basis to the research. This research is a descriptive and qualitative case study, of the type of experience report. The data were collected through semi-structured interviews, carried out with members of the two generations, analyzed by the content analysis method. The interviews revealed that the company under study has a simplified view of the succession process. This simplified view is explained by the company's own history and its founding patriarch, a man of humble origin. However, in order for the company to survive this important stage and remain relevant in its industry, it is necessary to abandon the simple way of thinking and understanding that the process of succession becomes more complex at the same pace as the family becomes larger.