Towards a Framework for Higher Education Curriculum for Small Family Business

There is an established policy discourse associated with the role of higher education (HE) in supporting the development of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) but far less attention tends to be given to the needs of small family businesses. Given their unique socio-cultural context and the sizeable contribution that family businesses make to society and the economy, this is perhaps surprising. The heterogeneity of family businesses and their preferences for entrepreneurial learning present significant challenges to education providers offering formal courses of study to SMEs. Very few UK university programmes address the knowledge and skills required to start and sustain family businesses and this may be seen to represent a significant market failure in the provision of higher-level learning services to this important sector of the economy. This paper adopts Miller and Seller’s (1990) framework that identifies three general educational orientations (transmission, transaction, and transformation) as a theoretical construct to explore the nature of university curriculum and the extent to which it connects with small family firm learning and development interests. This chapter introduces a framework to guide curriculum design influenced by the interests of small family businesses and considers some associated challenges and avenues for further investigation.