Entrepreneurial learning continued

Citation

Anderson, A.R. and Deakins, D. (1999), "Entrepreneurial learning continued", International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, Vol. 5 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijebr.1999.16005daa.001

Entrepreneurial learning continued

About the Guest Editors:

Alastair R. Anderson, PhD, is a lecturer and deputy director of the Centre for Entrepreneurship at Aberdeen University. Before entering academe, he started, owned and managed a variety of businesses. His research interest is small firms, with a focus on rural entrepreneurship. He has a particular interest in developing an understanding of entrepreneurship. He enjoys teaching both the theory and the practice of entrepreneurship and management.

Professor David Deakins holds the Renfrewshire Enterprise Chair in Enterprise Development at the University of Paisley and is director of Paisley Enterprise Research Centre (PERC). He is responsible for curriculum development, research, seminars and conferences connected with enterprise development and entrepreneurship at the University of Paisley. PERC was established in September 1994 and has gained an international reputation for innovative teaching and learning in enterprise and applied research. Current research projects of PERC include an ACCA-funded project on the role of non-executive directors of small firms, the role of mentors and a project on financial management in small firms. David Deakins holds an ESRC award for a successful seminar group on the finance of small firms. Previously, he has carried out research and published papers on finance and small firms, ethnic minority entrepreneurship and has published a well received text on entrepreneurship and small firms, which will be published as a second edition in 1999. David Deakins is currently president of the Institute for Small Business Affairs (ISBA), a UK networking body whose mission is to provide a bridge between academics and policy makers in small business and enterprise development.

Entrepreneurial learning continued

This issue completes the special edition of the IJEBR, of a selection of papers from the 2nd Enterprise and Learning Conference, held at the University of Aberdeen and organised by the Centre for Entrepreneurship. The previous issue of the Journal discussed the papers in the context of two themes that emerged from the papers presented at the conference concerned with entrepreneurial learning. These two themes consisted of the individual skill development of the entrepreneur (or entrepreneurial team) and his/her employees; and, second, on the ability of the firm as an "organisation" to acquire knowledge of the environment, competition and successful strategies. For a discussion of the relevant literature the interested reader is referred to the fuller editorial in the previous issue of IJEBR. We continue that editorial and the themes raised by discussing the remaining four papers which are published in this issue and discussed briefly in the rest of this editorial.

The first of the remaining four papers by Haugh and Pardy takes a broad, but very valid, approach to entrepreneurial learning. They apply the principle of entrepreneurship to community development in an economically fragile area of north east Scotland. They argue, convincingly, that the concept of enterprise need not be limited to for-profit activities, or indeed limited to individuals. Their paper demonstrates how Shumpertian "innovative recombinations" can be usefully applied to community development. The study shows how economic regeneration can be stimulated at a community level by an entrepreneurial approach. The principles of recognising an opportunity and developing it into a viable business appear to apply as much to communities as they do to aspiring conventional entrepreneurs. Interestingly, from both a policy and a theoretical perspective, they conclude that community empowerment may require the establishment of a group of motivated individuals.

The second paper by Blaydon, Keogh and Evans also looked at development issues but was concerned with skill development for senior managers in innovative technology based companies. The authors had identified a gap in managerial skills, particularly in strategic development of these growing companies. They note that many of these business leaders have a technical background which poorly equips them for the leadership function, they then argue that different managerial skills and knowledge become important during firm growth. The authors describe a programme, The Strategic Management Development Programme, currently offered by Robert Gordon's University which seeks to address these issues. The programme is interactive and builds upon the experiences of the managers by allowing them to identify key issues within their own organisations. Interestingly one generic issue identified was human resources. The programme requires managers to reflect first on the current and future needs of their company; second to integrate the marketing and new product development functions and finally to consider the financial implications. Research by the authors indicates that managers were quickly able to apply the majority of the analytical techniques developed.

The third paper by Chaston, Badger and Sadler-Smith considers organisational learning in SMEs. In a similar argument to Boussouara and Deakins' paper, below, Chaston et al note that; although, UK government intervention has supported commercial consultants and training schemes there is little evidence of improvement in SME performance. Consequently they argue that if these schemes have failed, there may be a need for an organisational learning approach. Their research addresses this question in the form of an empirical investigation of the relationship between organisational capability, organisational learning and firm performance in terms of sales growth. The results show no statistically significant difference in market orientation capability, or operational capability between growth and non-growth firms. Similarly there was no statistically significant relationship between any of the organisational learning modes and sales growth. Interestingly, they find that there is no direct relationship between overall organisational performance and organisational learning. This conclusion appears to contradict the normative view that firms who engage in organisational learning should expect an improvement in overall performance. Convincingly, they argue for a larger scale study to investigate the validity of the commonly articulated view of the benefits of organisational learning.

Finally, the fourth paper by Boussouara and Deakins has a similar theme to Blaydon et al's, in that both papers consider high technology small firms. However, Boussouara and Deakins use case study and interview evidence to examine the evolution and development of entrepreneurial strategies within high technology small firms. They too, note that technology-based entrepreneurs may suffer managerial skill deficiencies, in particular weak marketing, arguing that pre-start up entrepreneurs may come from either a public sector scientific research institution or from the R & D section of a large organisation. After a very useful review of different strands of marketing theory appropriate for technology-led firms they conclude that existing marketing tools are inadequate for discovering customers' needs in high-tech sectors, that expeditionary marketing is only suited to large firms and that the network approach is suitable, but not sufficient for understanding the marketing of high-tech entrepreneurs.

Their rich and detailed case studies provided evidence that firms had used their non technology early stages to develop some of the capabilities which they would require for high technology developments. Thus the novice entrepreneurs became better prepared to deal with strategy and marketing. Evidence from interviews confirms this position so that the authors conclude that experiential learning is important. Their results confirm that such learning depends on knowledge gained from dealing with customers, suppliers and other stakeholders. It is also in contrast to the limited value of expert led, consultancy driven short term intervention.

Finally, we complete this editorial by looking forward to the 3rd Enterprise and Learning Conference to be held in Paisley in November 1999. It is noticeable that Enterprise and Learning are becoming key themes in policy documents issued by all developed nations' governments as we move into the new millennium. As papers discussed over this special issue show; more rigorous and systematic research is needed in entrepreneurial learning to underpin these key developments.

Alastair R. AndersonDavid DeakinsGuest Editors