If companies have become obsessed with making workers part of a “family” or making the company feel like their own, it has been for multiple reasons. First of all, that feeling of being a part on a deeper and more emotional level helps to keep the talent going – or at least this is what critics of cool office models have been saying for years – by getting the worker to spend more time in it. your job, that gives ‘more’ for the company.
Second, a kind of loyalty to the company is also created. And, finally, it is much more likely that the employee becomes a brand advocate, a brand ambassador to consumers. Brand advocates are one of those upward trends and highly sought after by companies, because they manage to reach consumers in a much more direct way and because they operate at much higher levels of credibility. The buyer will create much more what they are told if it comes from them, as well as believe much more that it is a disinterested voice (unlike what happens when it is the brand itself, directly, that speaks).
But, as much as all companies aspire to have brand advocates or to create that sense of connection and loyalty with employees, not all are on the same level. You might think that the multinationals, with their seemingly limitless resources, are the ones that achieve the best results. In fact, based on what the studies on emotional connection and internal corporate responsibility contribute, it is the family business that has the most solid tools.
Family companies treat staff better Why? As a study carried out by researchers at the University of Salamanca has just shown, family companies – both those that are partially and wholly owned by a family – are much better when it comes to caring about their employees, than looking out for their good . The researchers analyzed the results of several hundred European companies between 2008 and 2017, comparing what happened with familiar ones and those that were not.
The first were those that showed the best data on internal corporate social responsibility. They were the ones who cared the most for their employees. If, in addition, a member of the owner’s own family is part of the board of directors, the data is even better. A question of identity Why is this happening? The study theorizes that it is possibly linked to the fact that the family identity is linked to the identity of the company. That is, how employees are treated is seen as a kind of reflection of how they are as a family.
Of course, these companies show worse data on corporate social responsibility in terms of environmental sustainability. Family businesses do not, therefore, have an advantage in all areas of corporate social responsibility. One could almost say that, as in families, one thing is what happens inside the home and another is what happens outside.