Despite increasing scholarly interest in the topic of innovation in the family firms, our understanding is still incomplete and inconsistent and the question of innovativeness of successors and family SMEs remains relatively unexplored (Botero et al. 2015). Our empirical research explores the relationship between the knowledge transfer in family SMEs and innovativeness of successors and of family SMEs during the succession process. Conducting a quantitative empirical research, our research results indicate that “early inclusion into family SME” and “learning by doing” are the most valued forms of the transfer of founder’s tacit and experiential knowledge and skills to the successor and are the most important for their and the family SMEs’ innovativeness. Regarding the external knowledge transfer, our research revealed that working experiences in other firms and external training are of high importance and positively correlated with innovativeness of successors and of family SMEs.