Search results

We advance entrepreneurship research by developing a theoretical model of how founding teams form. Our neo-Carnegie model situates nascent founders in particular network-structural milieus, engaging in aspiration-driven search for and evaluation of prospective co-founders. The formation of co-founding ties between nascent founders can be divided into four theoretical steps, which we label activation, evaluation, approach, and reciprocation. Successful founding team formation is a consequence of mutually favorable evaluations by nascent founders in a multi-sided matching process. Nascent founders with higher and less flexible aspirations are more likely to undertake distant search for co-founders by seeking referrals, forming ties with strangers, and forming new ties to social foci where they might meet potential co-founders. Churn in newly formed founding teams emerges as a consequence of shifting dominant coalition dynamics in the founding team caused by organic venture evolution and intentional changes in strategic direction. Our theoretical model provides new insights on the formation pathways of founding teams, their initial task and relational resource endowments, and initial team dynamics.

This article critically reconstructs how Auguste Comte and Herbert Spencer outlined the new scientific discipline of sociology in the nineteenth century. It aims to demonstrate how their ideas for founding sociology creatively responded to the challenges of creating a new science from scratch. Finally, a different view of the so-called “founding fathers” will enable a new self-conception of sociology today. Analyzing classical sociological works usually entails focusing on authors' ideas and concepts. This paper, on the other hand, takes into account the self-descriptions of these authors and examines how they present themselves as founders of sociology. It conducts a close reading of the sociological concepts and autobiographical texts written by both Comte and Spencer. This allows us to highlight the conceptual tension between the sociological subject matter, society as an ordered object, and the self-descriptions of the authors as exceptional scientists. It also demonstrates how important the figurative elements are in this analysis. This new approach contributes to the history of ideas in general and the history of sociology in particular by offering an exploration of narrative and figurative elements in the sociological “classics.” It thus creates a deeper understanding and clearer image of the foundations of what later became sociology. Founding a new discipline is a creative act that not only consists in theoretical conceptualizations but also implies figurative aspects. These can be found primarily in the way the authors describe themselves. Furthermore, their textual and diagrammatical articulations can be understood as “founding figures” on which the idea of a figurative sociology is based.

This chapter combines insights from organizational theory and the entrepreneurship literature to inform a process-based conception of organizational founding. In contrast to previous discrete-event approaches, the conception argues that founding be viewed as a series of potential entrepreneurial activities – including initiation, resource mobilization, legal establishment, social organization, and operational startup. Drawing on an original data set of 591 entrepreneurs, the study examines the effect of structural, strategic, and environmental contingencies on the relative rates with which different founding activities are pursued. Results demonstrate that social context has a fairly pervasive impact on the occurrence and sequencing of founding processes, with one possible exception being the timing of legal establishment.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate into the conditions under which founders’ human capital (HC) benefits new venture growth (NVG). One such condition is investigated in this study – initial assets at founding. Specifically, founding assets are hypothesized to moderate the relationship between founders’ HC and NVG.

The longitudinal panel database from the Kauffman Firm Survey for the period 2004–2011 was used to test the hypotheses. The final sample consisted of 4,923 firms, with 34,461 observations made over seven years.

The regression analysis found the effect of founders’ HC on NVG and the moderating role of founding assets in the HC–NVG relationship.

New ventures benefit even more from founders’ education level, industry and startup experiences when the startups have larger assets at founding. The effect of founders’ education and experiences on startup growth is contingent upon the initial assets at founding.

The results of this study can help practitioners and policy makers to understand the drivers of NVG and the interactions among these drivers. Growth-oriented startups may require a large investment in founding assets such as production facilities. Startups with fewer founding assets may find it particularly difficult to negotiate with external stakeholders and may face unusually intense competitive responses from competitors. Policy makers should tailor the support to the founding conditions of new firms.

The prior literature has shown mostly the independent positive effects of various resources on firm growth. This study argues and empirically shows that startups grow faster when founders with high HC have more assets to utilize. The resource-based view literature was expanded by adding important new causal mechanisms, enriching our understanding of how founders’ HC interact with founding assets, jointly affecting NVG. Like a big fish in a small pond, even highly educated and experienced entrepreneurs have limited opportunities to utilize their talents in a startup with a lower initial resource position.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of founding-family firms on managerial ability.

Founding-family firms are determined by founder and/or family involvement as block holder and as in the firm board. Managerial ability is estimated by data envelopment analysis. Research samples consist of 412 manufacturing firm-years listed in the Indonesian Stock Exchange. Analysis data use random-effect regression as the main analysis and Huber-White regression as an alternative analysis.

This research finds that founding-family firms have a negative effect on managerial ability. Further, the result shows that lower managerial ability occurred when founding-family firms led by founder and professional CEOs, when other family members involved in the ownership and the board have higher family ownership. It indicates that founding-family firms concern more about family interest, such as family reputation, rather than business needs and best management practice.

Limitation of this research does not occur if the founding-family firms are managed by first, second, third, etc., family generation. Future research expected to consider family generation in founding-family firms management.

This research can be used by founding-family firms in Indonesia as consideration of management policy formulation that can improve managerial ability.

This research provides new evidence if founding-family firms promote lower managerial ability in emerging market such Indonesian market where family businesses are the root of private businesses which have a major contribution to economics.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework to link founding team and start‐up competitive advantage in the context of the Taiwanese technology‐based ventures.

The paper analyzes 211 start‐ups of the technology‐based sector and verifies the relationship between entrepreneur resources, trust, founding team partners' commitments, and start‐up competitive advantage.

In technology‐based start‐ups, the competitive advantage of a start‐up is determined by the founding team partners' commitments and the resources an entrepreneur has.

This study is retrospective which relies on technology‐based founding team members as the primary research subjects, some respondents may observe the performance of their start‐ups today and then make attributions about the past to explain that performance.

Utilizations of personal networks are important in the early stage of technology‐based start‐ups; through networking and using trust, an entrepreneur can gain the critical resources and competitive advantage required in the development of a business.

In technology‐based start‐ups, trust, not the resources an entrepreneur has, is an effective way by which entrepreneurs can win founding team partners' commitments.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the extent to which founding‐family firms create value. In particular, the paper investigates how agency costs and monitoring capabilities influence the value creation process.

The empirical analysis relies on unique hand‐collected ownership data that has been collected for all Swedish publicly listed firms in the years 2001 to 2010 (2,128 observations). The research design employs level regression specifications and they are tested using pooled cross‐sectional regressions with controls for year and industry fixed effects.

The paper confirms previous studies that firms with founding family ownership have a higher value (Tobin's Q) and higher performance (RNOA). In contrast to prior studies, the paper finds that firm value and performance is significantly higher when ownership is concentrated the most. The paper also shows that firm value and performance is significantly lower for long‐term non‐founding‐family ownership.

This is one of the largest single‐country analyses of founding family owner effects on value and performance in publicly listed firms. The paper confirms known associations between ownership and performance in a unique institutional setting. The paper extends previous research findings by identifying differences in value and performance between founding family owners and long‐term non‐founding‐family owners.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of founding team experience (industry and venturing) in new venture creation. This paper posits the following questions: How does founding team experience influence the likelihood of new venture creation, in the nascent stage? How does industry context moderate this relationship? The study aims to fill an important gap in the literature by unpacking the impact of different types of founding team experiences on venture outcome, and by focusing on the influence of founding team in the venture creation process, specifically at the nascent stage.

The paper utilizes data from the Second Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics, a longitudinal data set of 1,214 nascent entrepreneurs in the USA. Logistics regression was employed to analyze the effect of founding team experience on new venture creation. Post hoc analysis was conducted to ensure the confidence of the findings.

The paper provides empirical insights about how founding team experience influences the likelihood of new venture creation in the nascent stage. At the nascent stage, founding team industry experience positively affects new venture creation while founding team venturing experience does not. However, in the high-technology industry environment, the influence of the founding team’s venturing experience on new venture creation is stronger than that in the low-technology industry environment.

Due to the design of the data set, there is a risk of “right-censoring” problem. Also, because the study used archival data on founding teams, the methodology did not allow for uncovering the underlying team processes and dynamics during the venture creation process based on learning from experience. Future studies are encouraged to examine other types of founding team experience and the underlying process-level factors on venture creation.

The paper provides important practical implications for nascent entrepreneurs/entrepreneurial teams on team assembling and composition. In general, a team with higher-level industry experience is critical for venturing success. A team with higher-level venturing experience is more desired in the high-technology industry.

This paper fulfills an important gap in the entrepreneurial team literature by highlighting the complex and nuanced ways in which founding team experience influences the likelihood of venture creation in the nascent stage of the firm, especially after incorporating the additional impact of the industry context.

The purpose of this paper is to apply the social cognitive theory and social learning theory to examine the different mechanisms through which entrepreneurs’ moral awareness and ethical behavior affect the product innovation of new ventures.

The authors collected survey data from 150 founders and 389 founding team members of new ventures in China in 2015. The final sample contained 113 questionnaires from entrepreneurs and 246 questionnaires from their founding team members. Regression analyses were used to test direct effects, and Preacher and Hayes’ (2004) formal mediation test approach with bootstrapping method was used to evaluate the mediation effects.

The findings indicate that the ethical levels of entrepreneurs can affect the product innovation of a new venture through two paths: entrepreneurs with low levels of moral awareness tend to be more individually creative, which facilitates product innovation, and entrepreneurs with high levels of ethical behavior can make founding teams more creative, which also promotes product innovation.

The findings of this study suggest that entrepreneurs are not negatively affected by their low moral awareness as long as they exhibit high ethical behavior with founding team members. But such low moral awareness has to be genuine. The best way to promote product innovation in the long run is to create an organizational culture of ethical behavior rather than to ignore moral issues in decision-making.

This study challenges the assumption that moral awareness and ethical behavior are always consistent. It takes an initial step to resolve the contradiction in the current literature regarding the relationship between the ethical levels of entrepreneurs and product innovation in the context of founders and founding teams in new ventures.