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The purpose of this paper is to analyse the impact of gender (F/M), at the management level, on the family company’s performance.

Company size, age, region and business sector were used as control variables in order to confirm the adjustment of the model to the theory. GMM dynamic panel models were used in order to control for: endogeneity; time-invariant characteristics; possible collinearity between independent variables; effects from possible omission of independent variables; elimination of non-observable individual effects; and the correct estimation of the relationship between the dependent variable in the previous and current periods. The study used data from 199 Portuguese family companies, from 2006 to 2014.

The results confirm the hypothesis from corporate governance literature, which argues that board diversity is potentially positively related to firm performance, showing that the presence of a female element in family firms’ direction has positive impacts on their performance, compared to those with only male elements. Also, the results show that region and sector of activity are factors influencing family firm performance. Finally, the study confirms that company size and age are variables helping to explain these companies’ life-cycle.

The study contributes to the literature on family firms regarding the effect of gender on family firm performance. The use of dynamic panel data models will make a strong contribution to this, as the problem of endogeneity is dealt with correctly here through using these models, and the possible collinearity between independent variables and correct estimation of the relationship between the dependent variable in previous and current periods.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the importance assigned to the various criteria used by the Portuguese venture capitalists (VCs) to evaluate and select early stage venture capital (VC) projects.

The data were collected through a questionnaire answered by 20 Portuguese VCs. The authors use descriptive statistics techniques and non-parametric tests to identify the most valued criteria and test differences in the importance assigned to the criteria of several types of VCs and investments.

The study reveals that personality and experience of the entrepreneur and of the management team are the most valued groups of criteria. VCs with a majority of private share capital value more the personality of the entrepreneur and management team than the companies with a majority of public share capital. Additionally, the VCs that did not yet internationalize consider the personality of the entrepreneur and management team and the financial aspects, to be more important than the VCs that have already expanded abroad.

It provides evidence on the VCs behavior in a small VC market. Since most of the existing literature on this area refer to large VC markets, the present study is important to investigate whether the conclusions reached by the previous studies can be extended to a small VC market. Also, this study is a contribution to the literature on the internationalization of VCs and it is the first study that explores the impact of the VCs being internationalized on the value given to the various selection criteria of early stage VC projects.