Owner motivation in small size family farms: insights from an exploratory study on the ornamental plant industry

Owner motivations are a relatively new area of investigation, which has seen over the last fifteen years the succession of numerous articles and studies.Therefore an in-depth study of the owner motivation can become an useful and strategic tool for improving strategies of small firm success. This case study particularly aims to analyse this phenomenon in the context of the ornamental plant sector, considering that the characteristics of this sector may be indicative of the ongoing dynamics for modern agricultural productions. The analysis was designed and planned in order to identify the owners motivations within family farm and it was conducted by segmenting the sample into two sub-samples according to a range of different production (short or long productive cycle) and economic size farm.Results allow to highlight how emotion item is particularly relevant for owners in both groups. Affective motivation is a key factors influencing the actions and business approaches of respondents. In addition inheritance is another predominant motivation among respondents that prompted the decision to become an owner. The findings also show interesting questions that could have on the potential impact about the owner’s decision-making. In fact, we have identified two aspects of owner action, which can be exclusively the competence of the individual (Group A), or well distinct among managerial responsible management and commitment to operational management skills and more knowledge of human resources (Group B). Despite the limit of the research, this study contributes to report the results for a specific region and a specific sector, its empirical applications could reasonably be extensible and also applicable to other similar agricultural sectors of the Mediterranean, with a high level of technological innovation and a high level of owners’ know-how where there remains a strong link between businesses and socio-familiar context. Keywords: micro size farms, innovation, ownership, organization training management.