Firms as Quasi-Traditions: The Moral Backbone of Social Legacy

In family firms, social legacies have been characterized as fragile and likely to be abandoned as firms face cycles of crises and change that impact the utility of such legacies, and yet we know that social legacies can and do endure across time and space, even beyond the tenure of the founding family. We explore intergenerational dynamics in family firms and specifically address the “social legacy” concept, which has received remarkably little empirical and theoretical attention. We elaborate how social legacies are shaped across time and space by drawing upon a historical-archival study of Rathbones PLC, a firm with a near-300-year history, to illustrate that firms can be understood as quasi-traditions and, furthermore, that a social legacy can provide firms with a moral backbone that anchors the quasi-tradition to ensure continuity amidst periods of crisis. For practitioners, we highlight that stewarding firms as quasi-traditions is an underappreciated, yet critical capability.