Empowerment in small businesses
Participation and Empowerment: An International Journal
ISSN: 1463-4449
Article publication date: 1 November 1999
Abstract
The concept of empowerment has received a great deal of attention in recent years. However, the empowerment knowledge base is predominantly large company‐oriented with little evidence of understanding what empowerment means in a small business context. It is inappropriate to treat the small firm as a microcosm of a large organisation. The small business is qualitatively as well as quantitatively different and this article propounds that it is questionable whether the concept of empowerment and its various dimensions as portrayed in the literature are readily transferable to small businesses. It is suggested that empowering management approaches are key features of successful growth‐oriented small firms but the current body of empowerment literature fails to encapsulate the idiosyncrasies and informalities of the small business operation, and thus convey understanding of the unique and novel forms of empowerment which facilitate sustainable development. Case study insight is used to support these propositions.
Keywords
Citation
Wyer, P. and Mason, J. (1999), "Empowerment in small businesses", Participation and Empowerment: An International Journal, Vol. 7 No. 7, pp. 180-193. https://doi.org/10.1108/14634449910298169
Publisher
:MCB UP Ltd
Copyright © 1999, MCB UP Limited