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Entrepreneurship as connecting: some implications for theorising and practice

Alistair R. Anderson (Centre for Entrepreneurship, Aberdeen Business School, Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, UK)
Sarah Drakopoulou Dodd (ALBA Graduate School of Business, ALBA, Vouliagmeni, Greece)
Sarah L. Jack (Lancaster University Management School, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK)

Management Decision

ISSN: 0025-1747

Article publication date: 25 May 2012

6610

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to consider why entrepreneurship theorising has become fragmented and how the research problem might be resolved.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors first examine how entrepreneurial constructs reflect only part of what we “mean” by the construct to argue that we use different social constructions. This explains why theories are fragmented. But the authors then ask how we might use and reconcile this diversity, pointing to the utility of the constructs as part of a complex whole. The authors discuss entrepreneurship as a complex adaptive system showing how connections and relatedness help explain the power of entrepreneurship to use and adapt to change.

Research implications

The authors' proposition of entrepreneurial endeavours as a complex adaptive system provides a fresh theoretical platform to examine aspects of entrepreneurship and improve theorising.

Practical implications

The authors argue that this idea of connecting can also be used at the level of practice – how the connections that entrepreneurs use may help to explain some of what goes on in entrepreneurial practice.

Originality/value

The paper's contribution is a relatively novel way of connecting diverse theorising.

Keywords

Citation

Anderson, A.R., Drakopoulou Dodd, S. and Jack, S.L. (2012), "Entrepreneurship as connecting: some implications for theorising and practice", Management Decision, Vol. 50 No. 5, pp. 958-971. https://doi.org/10.1108/00251741211227708

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2012, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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