Role of intergenerational cultural value creation and enforcement in fostering family business sustainability in emerging economies: evidence from Zimbabwean indigenous African business leaders

Purpose Family business sustainability has gained momentum in the corporate discourse in recent years owing to the significant contribution of family businesses to gross domestic product and poverty alleviation. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of intergenerational cultural value creation and enforcement in fostering family business sustainability. Design/methodology/approach With the adoption of the interpretivism philosophy, an exploratory research design was used, which supports the use of the purposive sampling technique. Data saturation was reached at the 19th interviewee. Thematic analysis was applied in terms of qualitative data analysis whereby the themes were emerging from the dataset. Findings The results revealed that indigenous African family businesses created and enforced values such as hard work; Christian ethos and straightforwardness; teamwork; honesty, transparency and accountability; integrity; and family relations. Hard work was mostly witnessed in family businesses being run by founding generations, whereas team work was most prevalent in successive generations. Authoritarian style was mostly used in the first generation, though some third-generation members revealed the use of the same style to enforce values. Benevolent authoritarian style was witnessed in the second generation. Research limitations/implications The limitation of the study is evident in its qualitative multiple-case study approach where just a few cases were selected. This implies that the findings cannot be generalized to all African family businesses. However, these findings can be generalized to family businesses with the same or similar backgrounds as those studied, especially in Zimbabwe. Further research can focus on quantitatively measuring the relationship that exists between cultural value creation and enforcement as a leadership practice on indigenous African family business performance metrics. Practical implications There are some practical contributions derived from this study in terms of ensuring the continuity of family businesses since values are the foundation upon which successful businesses can be built. Thus, the ability to create and transfer values to future generations buttresses the notion of ensuring the long-term survival of family businesses. Moreover, values such as teamwork and transparency can be successfully transmitted to successive generations in an effort to ensure the long-term survival of indigenous African family businesses. Social implications The findings of this study can go a long way in creating better societies in African economies. The promotion of values such as transparency, team-work, hard work and integrity has the potential to enhance trust and unity within communities. These intergenerational values buttress key principles of Ubuntu philosophy and Christianity. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to investigate cultural value creation and enforcement as an intergenerational leadership practice in indigenous African family businesses, particularly across first, second and third generations.