Contact Info:
Sharon J. Bracken
254-710-4290
Sharon_K_Johnson@baylor.edu

Article Published in Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice gets National Attention

An article published in Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice was featured in a segment of the "Today Show" on May 7, 2005. The article, "An Exploratory Comparison of the Behavioral Dynamics of Top Management Teams in Family and Nonfamily New Ventures: Cohesion, Conflict, Potency, and Consensus," studied the differences between parent and child management teams and non-family management teams.

Michael D. Ensley, who coauthored the article with Allison W. Pearson, was interviewed on the "Today Show" about their research that indicated family businesses with a parent/child management team are more cohesive and have less conflict than other family and non-family businesses.

According to their research, parent and child management teams work better than non-family teams. "Certainly there are dysfunctional relationships between parents and children, but when they are functional at all they are powerful social capital tools," Ensley said in the interview.

The article generated a great deal of media interest. Allison Pearson was also interviewed by the magazine "Workforce Management," as well as a newspaper in Raleigh, NC.

Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice is an academic journal published by Baylor University and Blackwell Publishing. It is a highly ranked journal in the field of entrepreneurship and is listed in the Social Sciences Citation Index.

Michael D. Ensley, of the Lally School of Management & Technology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and Allison W. Pearson, of the College of Business & Industry at Mississippi State University, are experts in the area of management teams.