Massimo Baù

Senior Associate Professor
CeFEO Director

massimo.bau@ju.se

Massimo Baù is Senior Associate Professor in Family Business and Ownership at the Jönköping International Business School (JIBS) in Sweden and Director of the Centre for Family Entrepreneurship and Ownership (CeFEO).

He is Research Director and member of the Board of the International Family Enterprise Research Academy (IFERA), Fellow Family Firms Institute (FFI), member of the Academic Advisory Board of the Boards Impact Forum, and co-founder of the European Family Business Centers (EuFBC) Network.

Moreover, he is an Affiliated Faculty of the Family Business Institute at the Grossman School of Business, University of Vermont, and a member of the Scientific Committee of the National Centre for Family Business at Dublin City University.

He joined JIBS and CeFEO in 2012.

In 2011 he obtain a PhD in Business Administration from the University of Udine (Italy) writing a thesis entitled "Family embeddedness and entrepreneurial entry" having as supervisors Cristiana Compagno (University of Udine) and Mattias Nordqvist (JIBS).

His research interests are related to the entrepreneurial process in three main research areas. First, family dynamics and the influence of family members on the actor's decision of entry and exit into the entrepreneurial process. Second, academic entrepreneurship and factors enabling new venture start-up and technology transfer. Third, firm's growth paths through collaborative agreements and inter-firms networks. He explores these phenomena adopting a quantitative approach and often adopting Big Data analysis techniques using different datasets, including Statistics Sweden.

His contributions have been published in Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice (2023; 2020 External link, opens in new window.; 2019 External link, opens in new window.; 2017 External link, opens in new window.), Long Range Planning (2019 External link, opens in new window.), Small Business Economics (2021 External link, opens in new window.; 2013 External link, opens in new window.), Journal of Business Ethics (2020 External link, opens in new window.), Strategic Organization (2022 External link, opens in new window.), Entrepreneurship and Regional Development (forthcoming; 2021), International Small Business Journal (2022), Journal of Small Business Management (2014), Business Strategy and the Environment (forthcoming), and Journal of Family Business Strategy (2020a External link, opens in new window.; 2020b). He is a member of the editorial review board of Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, and Journal of Family Business Strategy. Moreover, he serves as editor for FamilyBusiness.org. 

His teaching activities are focused on Family Business, Entrepreneurship, Creativity, Design Thinking, and Research Methods. He is currently the examiner of several family business courses at the Bachelor, Master, and Doctoral levels, including the executive courses in Family Business for Next Generation and Family Business Management and the doctoral courses in Theoretical Perspectives of Family Business and Family Business Research Method.

He is the Research Director of the International Family Enterprise Research Academy (IFERA) and a member of the Board. He is also the Director of the IFERA Summer School on Family Business Research Methods, organized as a partnership between IFERA and CeFEO. He has also been Chair of the IFERA Conference (2017).

As a Co-Chair of the EIASM Workshop on Family Business Management together with Kajsa Haag, he has organized four EIASM Workshops in collaboration with several universities, such as EuFBC (online, 2021), University of Cork (Cork, 2022), University of Naples Federico II (Naples, 2023), and ESADE Business School (Barcelona, 2024). Moreover, he served as Chair of the Family Business Strategic Interest Group at the European Academy of Management (EURAM) conference (2015-2018),

He is a Fellow of the Family Firms Institute (Boston), the leading association worldwide for family enterprise professionals. FFI Fellow is the highest level of professional designation within the organization. Moreover, he has received the Certificate in Family Business Advising (CFBA), Certificate in Advanced Family Business Advising (ACFBA) and the Certificate in Family Wealth Advising (CFWA) from the Family Firms Institute (FFI, Boston, MA). FFI is an international professional membership organization of over 1800 individuals and organizations across 88 countries, dedicated to providing interdisciplinary education and networking opportunities for family business and family wealth advisors, consultants, educators and researchers.

He is a member of the Academic Advisory Board of the Board Impact Forum, the Nordic chapter of the Climate Governance Initiative, in collaboration with the World Economic Forum. The purpose is to engage board directors in Nordics and internationally to accelerate climate actions and innovation for sustainable business and a sustainable world.

Moreover, he is a Certified Trained Facilitator of LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® methodology and a Babson Fellow in Entrepreneurship Education.