TY - GEN A1 - Markopoulos, Evangelos A1 - Ukperaj, Denis A1 - Vanharanta, Hannu KW - Family business KW - Succession KW - Entrepreneurship KW - People KW - Economy KW - Society KW - Governance KW - Management KW - Leadership KW - Balkan KW - Company democracy KW - Organizational culture PB - AHFE International UR - https://doi.org/10.54941/ahfe1001521 N2 - Given that the nomination of family and nonfamily members to top senior positions may set personal interests against corporate ones, this may lead to serious problems in the firm?s strategic direction when the two are not compatible. Consequently, potential successors should be assessed across different domains to determine who is the best fit for a leadership role. Accordingly, this paper introduces the Democratic Employee Connect Model (DECM), a step-gated framework that can provide a potential solution for family businesses when planning for management succession. It comprises six steps, which will guide family-owned enterprises during this crucial process. The six steps of the model align with the Company Democracy Model to democratically identify the most suitable candidate in the succession process, which is often driven by personal and family interests. The paper also presents research limitations that can be considered for future research. ID - discovery10153329 N1 - © 2022 Published by AHFE Open Access. The authors of papers published in the AHFE Open Access Proceedings will retain full copyrights as specified by the provisions of the Creative Commons: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. AV - public Y1 - 2022/// SP - 185 EP - 195 TI - Democratic Management Succession in Balkan Family Businesses: Appointment of Family and nonfamily Members in Leadership Roles ER -