Search results

To provide a qualitative, in‐depth, naturalistic, empirical inquiry into entrepreneurial decision‐making, through the application of grounded theory methodology.

Application of original Glaser and Strauss grounded theory methodological approach and subsequent works are situated in the comparatively new context of entrepreneurship and small business management. Gathered data are iteratively analysed to produce emergent conceptual categories and their underpinning properties. Emergent substantive theories of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial decision making are discussed against existing decision and entrepreneurship theories.

First, the examination of the appropriateness of applying grounded theory to investigating complex entrepreneurship issues, as analysed through conceptual categories drawn from an empirical study. Second, the theoretical exploration of emergent entrepreneurship bounded practices and associated tasks of decision‐making. Finally, through the revelation of what is inductively achievable, what can be practically learned by researching naturalistic entrepreneurship.

This process of iterative theory building, whilst grounded in a substantive inquiry, holds the capacity to generate further research questions and tentative explanations at broader formal levels. By cross cutting the boundaries of units of analyses – the entrepreneur or associated actors, for example – this results in the maturation of a complex web of human interactivities. From the research reported, questions beyond the substantive case can develop a broader theoretical and practical agenda. For example, issues such as: buying‐in to an established business, the managing of key skills workers in small enterprises, and, entrepreneurial decision‐making in conjunction with other actors’ involvement.

The application of grounded theory emergent research objectives, whilst originating from particular inductive investigations, can become foundations for better understanding broader entrepreneurship questions and practice‐based researched endeavours.

This paper contributes to the identified need for developing the stock of qualitatively bounded research within entrepreneurship and small business inquiry. It develops understanding of both the theoretical and practical nature of entrepreneurship, the managing of an enterprise and the synonymous task of making decisions.

This study explores how entrepreneurs modify their financial path(s) and go beyond job security to attain greater financial freedom. The present work examines the cash-flow quadrant (CFQ) attributes and demonstrates the importance of the push-pull factors for an individual's quadrant transition in achieving financial freedom.

A hypothetical model and an abductive approach were used through regression models in a population sample of 260 Bahraini entrepreneurs. Fuzzy participatory cognitive mapping was also used to develop a conceptual model of financial path transition's decision making among entrepreneurs and study the impact of certain push-pull factors on the entrepreneurs' decisions.

The triangulated study identifies six categories of variables: financial freedom, workplace condition, independence, salary level, family life-building and retirement savings as key pull-push factors that significantly impact financial path transition's decision. Fuzzy cognitive mapping (FCM) extends our knowledge of the dynamics of CFQ transitions from a push-pull factor perspective. The results indicate no significant differences between the variables listed in the regression model and the fuzzy cognitive map model. Four categories of pull-push factors appeared as the entrepreneurs' top rankings when ordered by complexity, centrality scores and impact weight. These categories were workplace conditions, financial freedom, independence and salary level. The findings widen the scope of knowledge of each quadrant and rationalize how and why such factors impact quadrant decisions among Bahraini entrepreneurs.

Many studies discuss the CFQ model and consider its quadrants a specific method for identifying a unique financial path to generate income. A shifting quadrant occurs when individuals want to change their financial path and move beyond job security to achieve more financial freedom. Although this transition is well-established in the literature, the factors accounting for the individual's transition across quadrants have not received enough attention. This study fills this gap and calls for more in-depth investigations of this area to better understand the dynamics of CFQ transitions from a push-pull factor perspective.

This chapter is a reflection on the Shepherd and Zacharakis (1997) paper, which starts with a review of citations in the intervening 20 years, and dives more deeply into these works to better describe and consider the evolution and use of conjoint analysis in entrepreneurship research. The proliferation of new uses for a conjoint analysis are identified, such as more studies of entrepreneurial decision making, which came to supplant the early efforts, which focused on venture capital decisions. Additional expansions into other entrepreneurship stakeholder groups are also reviewed. The use of conjoint as an accelerator of multilevel research is also noted, as are the improvements and challenges in conjoint methodologies as the field has matured.

This chapter is aimed at developing a conceptual framework for the internationalization process of social business (SB). The study has been conducted by reviewing the literature on social entrepreneurship, SB, and internationalization of small business. The study indicated that the internationalization decision for SB is taken by the motivation to create a social impact in the target foreign location. Based on the analyses and related literature, the entrepreneur-specific, firm-specific, and context-specific factors affecting the internationalization decision of social entrepreneurs are presented. As part of the framework, the chapter explains opportunity identification and the internationalization implementation phases for SBs. One of the key contributions of the chapter is the depiction of an internationalization framework for SB, which is an innovative addition to social entrepreneurship literature. The framework developed here could help social entrepreneurs to take decisions for scaling their businesses internationally.

Confidence gives entrepreneurs the belief that they can exercise control and that they have the ability to ensure the success of a focal entrepreneurial endeavor. However, failure can rattle an entrepreneur's confidence causing them to question their belief and ability. This study investigates the link between confidence and entrepreneurial plan upon reentry after crowdfunding failure. Particularly, it examines whether more confident entrepreneurs who failed in their original crowdfunding endeavor persist or change their plan in terms of the positioning of the crowdfunding endeavor and the funding goal in the subsequent attempt.

Using a sample of 2179 serial crowdfunding entrepreneurs who initially experienced failure before launching a subsequent crowdfunding endeavor, this study explores and tests four hypotheses on the relationship between confidence and the change implemented by entrepreneurs in their subsequent crowdfunding endeavors after failure.

The results suggest that more confident entrepreneurs who experienced failure in their initial crowdfunding endeavor persist in their positioning when they attempt a subsequent endeavor. However, no strong relationship was observed between entrepreneurial confidence and persistence with the funding goal of the initial crowdfunding plan in the subsequent crowdfunding endeavor. The study also finds suggestive but inconclusive evidence that the level of negative performance in the failed crowdfunding endeavor moderates the relationship between the entrepreneur's confidence and change in crowdfunding positioning.

This study provides new insights into the effect of entrepreneurial confidence on crowdfunding endeavors after an initial failure. Prior research has focused on its effect in driving the performance of crowdfunding endeavors rather than on how it may affect the plan in terms of the positioning and funding goal enacted by the entrepreneur after experiencing failure.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate formation of a copreneurial identity during new venture creation by investigating underpinnings of spousal commitment considering business communication quality.

The study was grounded in identity theory, used a longitudinal copreneurial sample, and SEM modeling. Entrepreneurial literature is filled with how entrepreneurs form their identity, but little is known about how entrepreneurs and their spouses mutually form their copreneurial identity.

Entrepreneurs’ reported spouses having high Time 1 commitment, but spouses reported they were more committed than reported by entrepreneurs. Links between spouse’s Time 1 commitment self‐assessment and Time 2 entrepreneur’s assessment of spousal commitment differed by business communication quality. Time 1 spouse’s commitment self‐assessment was positively related to Time 2 entrepreneur’s appraisal of spousal commitment only for the high business communication group and not for the low business communication group. For couples having high business communication quality, entrepreneur’s assessment of spousal commitment over time was composed of spouse’s self‐assessment of commitment and entrepreneur’s appraisal of spousal commitment, reflecting the mutual verification of a copreneurial identity.

This study provides evidence for Van Auken and Werbel's proposition that an entrepreneur's decision to launch a new business depends not only on opportunity analyses but also on the degree that an entrepreneur's spouse shares a common vision about firm goals. This study not only contributes to the theoretical development of a copreneurial identity but it also addresses measurement issues related to spousal business identity formation. Unlike previous studies considering spousal commitment in terms of marital status or work involvement, a measurement model for spousal commitment was tested using three indicators of cognitive moral commitment. Distinctions were made in stock and flow measures of spousal social capital and initial spousal stock levels were assessed. Furthermore, there appeared to be relatively high consistency between entrepreneur's assessment of spousal commitment and spousal's reflection of their own commitment, suggesting that the spousal commitment construct has some clearly defined properties.

This study aims to build and test an International Market Selection (IMS) decision process method that is able to capture, within a small firm’s risk-averse setting, the entrepreneur's experience, reduce cognitive biases, and preserve the flexibility of the decision, by combining the advantages of systematic and behavioural-based international market selection approaches.

The unit of analysis is the IMS decision process of a small firm venturing abroad. We adopt a ranking approach based on three-step screening. We assess the markets through a multi-criteria approach with a wider set of variables aggregated within a tree-shaped model. To obtain the ranking, we use a Fuzzy Expert System (FES) as an evaluative tool.

The results show that the proposed decision method is consistent with the entrepreneur’s strategic orientation and experience, while preserving the flexibility requested for decision-making in small firms. Unlike traditional behavioural IMS approaches, the method demonstrates an ability to reduce the cognitive biases associated with the use of a limited set of variables and unreliable evaluation models.

The single-case-study approach limits generalization of the findings.

The proposed methodology helps the decision-maker to improve the quality of the IMS decision by reducing the effect of cognitive biases that usually affect traditional behavioural models.

For the first time, a decision-process methodology based on an FES is applied to a small firm’s IMS problem.

Micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) are a critical part of a country or region’s economy. They have contributed to more than half of Indonesia’s gross domestic product. However, MSMEs today are still getting problems and obstacles in the Indonesian industry. One of them is the lack of knowledge about entrepreneurship that hampers the development of a business and the emergence of innovation. This study aims to understand the innovation process and extend the knowledge regarding entrepreneurship in food and beverage MSMEs in Greater Jakarta Area.

This study is descriptive–associative research. It uses the online survey as a data collection method with a cross-sectional design. The sampling technique is purposive sampling with the criteria foodpreneurs from MSMEs in Greater Jakarta Area. The data are measured using Likert scale and analyzed using structural equation modeling-partial least squares.

The results suggest that centralized decision-making positively impacts collaboration, communication and contributes to innovation. Communication effects the entrepreneur's knowledge and collective entrepreneurship. In terms of collaboration, it affects entrepreneur's knowledge and collective entrepreneurship. Then, the entrepreneur's knowledge and collective entrepreneurship influence innovation.

This research is only conducted using MSMEs of food and beverages in Greater Jakarta Area as the samples. Hence the results cannot be generalized. Different sectors may have different results.

A centralized decision can be done but limited in certain situations only. Then, foodpreneurs should collaborate and communicate more intensely with their employees. It will impact the harmonious collaboration and collective problem-solving to achieve creative solutions.

There is limited research focusing on foodpreneurs and the innovation process. So, this research results can add to the existing literature review.

This paper aims to examine the factors associated with a household business entrepreneur’s decisions to formalise the firm at a multidimensions level.

The data set is a panel of 2,336 SMEs and household businesses from Vietnamese SME surveys during the 2005–2015 period.

This study elucidates how firm-level resources, entrepreneur characteristics and costs of doing business influence an entrepreneur’s decision to enter, the speed and the degree of formality.

This study provides insight into the origins of an entrepreneur’s decisions to the multidimensions of business formality through the lenses of the resource-based view, entrepreneurship and institution theories.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the social-cognitive antecedents of an entrepreneur’s internationalization intent and a firm’s behavior. Building on the insights of social-cognitive psychology, the author develops a conceptual model linking an entrepreneur’s positive orientation, self-efficacy beliefs, internationalization intent and actual behavior of the firm.

The author tests this model with a sample of 310 Polish firms (including 241 domestic and 69 international new ventures), drawing on data collected first in 2006 and then in 2007.

The author finds that self-efficacy mediates between positive orientation and internationalization intent, and that an entrepreneur’s internationalization intent predicts a firm’s behavior (i.e. foreign market entry). Moreover, firm age moderates the relationship between an entrepreneur’s positive orientation and internationalization propensity among new ventures.

Overall, the findings demonstrate that social-cognitive theory is useful in predicting new venture internationalization.

Based on the findings, the author recommends that managerial education in international management combines the development of “formal” skills and cross-cultural competencies with experiential and vicarious learning.

The study combines insights from psychology and international business, thus responding to numerous calls for a more interdisciplinary and cognition-oriented focus on the international behavior of firms.