Theoretical Framework

The study integrates strategic leadership theory, organizational adaptation, and family business literature to explain divergent resilience pathways.

Key Theoretical Lenses:

1. Prospect Theory (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979)

• Family firms: Loss aversion drives cautious, risk-averse strategies to protect socioemotional wealth (SEW)—family control, identity, and legacy.
• Non-family firms: Performance pressures and investor expectations lead to higher risk tolerance and immediate action.

2. Real Options Theory (Dixit & Pindyck, 1994)

• Family firms: Strategic flexibility through staged investments and ‘wait-and-see’ approach preserves options under uncertainty.
• Non-family firms: Full, immediate commitments limit future strategic flexibility.

3. CEO Commitment Types (Meyer & Allen, 1991)

• Affective commitment: Deep emotional attachment, personal identification with the firm, long-term orientation (observed in family firm CEOs).
• Calculative commitment: Rational assessment of costs/benefits, transactional logic, focus on efficiency and value creation (observed in non-family firm CEOs).

4. Socioemotional Wealth (SEW) (Gómez-Mejía et al., 2007)

• Family firms prioritize non-financial goals—family control, identity preservation, intergenerational succession—alongside financial performance.
• SEW loss aversion explains why family firms adopt more cautious crisis responses.

Family Firms: Affective Commitment → Resilient Rebound

CEO Affective Commitment in Family Firms

• “This is my life, this is my own project, this is my life.” (CEO of Alpha)
• “For me, business, in fact, stopped being a business a long time ago, it’s kind of like a lifestyle.” (CEO of Gamma)
• “Alpha is my favourite toy.” (CEO of Alpha)
• “Strategically, yes, of course, I would like to stay until this very thing, until old age.” (CEO of Phi)

Strategic Response 1: ‘Wait-and-See’

• Alpha: “Well, we’ll wait a couple of months and then it will sort itself out… And we actually continued our work. So, in order to protect ourselves legally.”
• Gamma: “The general situation, it requires balanced, calm decisions with a cool head, so to speak, without succumbing to some emotional, momentary moment.”
• Lambda: “We spent some time, perhaps a week or a month, simply observing how events would unfold.”
• Lambda: “The right reaction cannot come from a heated mind.”
• Phi: “Well, as it were, I decided there, conditionally… look at the situation.”

Strategic Response 2: Revived Supplier Relationships

• Alpha: Shifted to Russian suppliers despite integration challenges: “I am visiting the supplier to address issues with a Russian component that I previously imported… Despite having obtained critical components, we are unable to integrate them into our operations effectively.”
• Lambda: Transitioned to Russian suppliers: “Well, of course, the suppliers have changed. Some houses are being built, of course, there are no German or Dutch elevators, they are Russian… As soon as it became clear that, well, these are also normal, that’s it, and everything started rushing back again.”
• Phi: Switched to DeCraft (Chinese brand available in Russia): “Schneider Electric has a brand that is cheaper, it is DeCraft… Well, it is available in Russia… And we kind of switched to DeCraft.”

Resilience Outcome: Resilient Rebound

All four family firms demonstrated resilient rebound—quick and effective recovery after a period of stress—as evidenced by net profit recovery in 2022–2023 (see Table 2 in the original article).

Theoretical Model:

Affective Commitment → Wait-and-See + Revived Supplier Relationships → Resilient Rebound

Non-Family Firms: Calculative Commitment → Fragile Decline

CEO Calculative Commitment in Non-Family Firms

• Kappa: “No, of course not [emotionally attached]. This over-emotional attachment is something I’m struggling with, to make it less and less, because I see that it’s detrimental to business development… I need unemotional managers.”
• Pi: “Given the past 2 years, I’m still exploring new opportunities, experimenting and attempting to launch various projects, but I would not want to become overly attached to any particular initiative… I would just like to delegate as much as possible to the team.”
• Tau: “I am personally ready to provide the same service; however, operating via a company as a legal entity is a more convenient and widely accepted mechanism in the market for offering my expertise.”
• Chi: “If someone came there now with a high price, saying, ‘Are you ready to sell?’ some deal to discuss, then yes, I am ready, let’s discuss a deal to sell.”

Strategic Response 1: Immediate Response

• Kappa: “Effective immediately, we are implementing a comprehensive halt to existing operations and initiating an intensive search for new entry points, exit strategies, and alternative pathways.” Within a month, opened representative office in China and manufacturing facility in Turkiye.
• Pi: “It’s as if we have become accustomed to operating, so to speak, on a day-to-day basis; we have simply adapted to the circumstances.” Completed ongoing projects, postponed new ones.
• Tau: “I simply realized that a vast array of opportunities had opened up. I began to actively engage in them.” Moved into markets vacated by Western competitors.
• Chi: “We procured supplies with a long-term perspective, meaning that while 2022 has passed, the company managed to generate profit; however, nearly all available liquidity was allocated to warehouse stockpiling.”

Strategic Response 2: Revived Employee Relationships

• Kappa: Transitioned to professional management: “This is my primary focus: I select personnel, grant them autonomy, and observe how the organization functions in my absence.” Established Turkish division with local staff: “The entire team is Turkish.”
• Pi: Addressed personnel shortage: “A QR code that allows customers to, hypothetically, access the restaurant’s system, place orders directly and thereby reduce the reliance on line staff, such as waiters, for example.”
• Chi: Responded to employee relocation abroad: “We now understand that people might just leave… we have built the entire sales and marketing chain; well, everything is there, from lead generation to the final transaction. And we have implemented all of this based on artificial intelligence.”

Resilience Outcome: Fragile Decline

Despite immediate responses, non-family firms exhibited fragile decline—prolonged vulnerability and unstable financial performance—as shown in net profit fluctuations (see Table 2 in the original article).

Theoretical Model:

Calculative Commitment → Immediate Response + Revived Employee Relationships → Fragile Decline

Implications & Future Research

Theoretical Contributions:

• Micro-foundations of resilience: Conceptualizes CEO commitment (affective vs. calculative) as a core mechanism explaining divergent resilience outcomes in family vs. non-family firms facing institutional crises.
• Nuanced resilience trajectories: Distinguishes between resilient rebound (rapid recovery fueled by relational strategies) and fragile decline (prolonged vulnerability from transactional actions).
• Extension of prospect theory: Shows how family firms’ loss aversion drives ‘wait-and-see’ approaches, while non-family firms’ performance orientation drives immediate commitments.
• Real options application: Family firms’ staged, relationship-focused adaptation reflects real options reasoning under uncertainty.

Practical Implications for Family Firms:

• Leverage affective commitment strategically: Recognize emotional attachment as a source of patient capital and long-term orientation during crises.
• Maintain supplier relationships: Invest in trust-based networks that can be reactivated when conditions stabilize.
• Use ‘wait-and-see’ deliberately: Combine patience with active monitoring to identify emerging opportunities.
• Balance caution with action: Ensure the waiting period includes intelligence gathering and contingency planning.

Practical Implications for Non-Family Firms:

• Build organizational trust: Complement transactional efficiency with investments in culture, communication, and employee development.
• Design flexible restructuring: Create plans that preserve core capabilities and relationships while achieving cost efficiencies.
• Develop leadership continuity: Reduce executive turnover to maintain strategic coherence through crises.
• Consider staged commitments: Apply real options logic by making reversible, incremental investments under uncertainty.

Policy Implications:

• Tailored support mechanisms: Provide family firms with market intelligence to make ‘wait-and-see’ periods more informed; help non-family firms design restructuring plans that minimize long-term cultural damage.
• Supply chain resilience programs: Support domestic supplier development and relationship-building initiatives.
• Leadership development: Offer crisis management training that addresses different commitment types and strategic logics.

Limitations & Future Research:

• CEO focus: Future studies should examine other personality traits (core self-evaluations, dark triad) and firm-level factors (culture, dynamic capabilities).
• SEW components: Investigate how specific socioemotional wealth priorities (control vs. identity) lead to distinct resilience pathways.
• Generalizability: Extend research to larger corporations and different institutional/cultural contexts beyond Russia.
• Quantitative validation: Test propositions with mixed-methods or longitudinal designs to measure long-term performance implications.
• Comparative studies: Contrast findings across high-income vs. lower-middle-income countries to understand how legal systems, cultural norms, and market institutions shape the commitment-response-resilience nexus.