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This article advances a conceptual typology delineating the differences and similarities between business- and social-sector new venture creators. Our classification scheme differentiates business and social entrepreneurs, considering characteristics of social entrepreneurs in a larger entrepreneurial context.Within a conceptual 2x2 typology based on two dimensions: drive (passion vs. business) and desired return (financial ROI vs. social ROI), we identify and classify 80 examples of new venture creators into one of the quadrants of an enterprise model of entrepreneurs. Preliminary results reveal similarities between social and traditional entrepreneurs and differentiate social entrepreneurs in terms of traits, goals, tendencies, and motivational sources.

This study aims to describe social entrepreneurs' motivation during the social entrepreneurship process and identify different social entrepreneurs in terms of their social characteristics.

The descriptive research design uses a directed qualitative interpretative approach based on 17 cases of social entrepreneurs active in healthcare innovation hubs.

The study describes the social entrepreneurs in a service context. Based on their key motivational characteristics, the study identifies three types of social entrepreneur: discoverers, seekers, and rangers. The study finds that not all of the three types regulate high levels of motivation during the social entrepreneurship process.

Depending on the type of social entrepreneur, the social entrepreneurship process requires different forms of support. In practice, the traditional R&D process deployed by innovation hubs is suitable for rangers; discoverers and seekers commonly regulate low levels of motivation when developing and introducing their social innovations to the market.

Most service research on social entrepreneurship focuses on the outcome; in contrast, this empirical study focuses on the individual entrepreneurs, their motivation and process. While previous research has treated motivation as an antecedent for engagement in the social mission of entrepreneurship, the present study investigates social entrepreneurs’ motivation in relation to the social entrepreneurship process, providing insights in the behavior of social entrepreneurs.

This paper aims to provide a multidisciplinary framework that allows an integrated understanding of reasons of success or failure in equity crowdfunding (ECF), a Fintech digital innovation of the traditional entrepreneurial finance, defining a future research agenda.

A systematic literature review (SLR) has been conducted on 127 documents extracted from two multidisciplinary repositories (Elsevier’s Scopus and Clarivate Analytics Web of Science) for the period between 2015 and early 2022. After a systematized series of inclusion and exclusion criteria, in line with the objectives and conceptual boundaries, a final list of 32 peer-reviewed articles written in English was analyzed by the authors through a meta-synthesis and thematic analysis to identify the key themes and dominant concepts.

Results show that the body of literature is recent and fast growing. The proposed integrative framework of existing research indicates that the outcome of an ECF campaign is related to signals conveyed by entrepreneurs in the form of hard information (firm characteristics, financial information, business characteristics and project description) and soft information (intellectual capital, human capital, social capital and social media network), catalyzed by digital media that facilitate also personal interactions between entrepreneurs and investors. Similarly, external factors (investors and campaign characteristics, with the fundamental role of ECF platform managers in building trust between entrepreneurs and investors) allow for the alleviation of information asymmetries. The present study sheds light on which signal mechanisms are decisive in improving the outcome, taking into consideration various disciplines which follow different but complementary perspectives.

Entrepreneurs should adapt to the transition toward the digital era, exploiting alternative financial instruments and learning effective signaling strategies, within a large variety of skills requested. Platform managers can obtain more focused information on selected entrepreneurial projects more efficiently.

Although it is fast-growing, the field of research is very recent, still fragmented and limited to the perspective/discipline followed. This SLR is, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, the first multidisciplinary and integrative analysis of reasons that motivates success, or failure, of an equity-based crowdfunding campaign. The digital nature of ECF encourages future research to move toward more pioneering and unconventional theories and research methods. Hence, the authors add to the existing literature by proposing future patterns of research based on an integration of highly technological skills and behavioral/psychological approaches.

The purpose of this paper is to critically evaluate the meaning of being a social entrepreneur in a society marked with multiple transitions. It aims to understand how theoretical concepts of social entrepreneurs, including common dichotomies between economic and social, collective and individual, reflect in social entrepreneurs’ rationale, values and identities.

The study used an exploratory and qualitative approach. Empirical data were gathered during 14 semi-structured interviews with Croatian social entrepreneurs. Thematic analysis was used as an analytical framework.

The findings suggest complexity of social entrepreneurs’ rationale and identities as they face challenges in balancing different goals. Democratic and participative governance appeared to be the weakest link of social enterprises. Identity of social entrepreneurs in the society of multiple transitions is fluid and changes through the continuum from pure social to pure commercial, from more related to civil society to more related to the market, from mostly individual to mostly collective.

The main limits of the study are related to sampling strategy and the small sample size. Generalization is limited by the nature of qualitative research and relies on analytical and naturalistic generalization.

The findings of the study may contribute to ecosystem development that would be more suitable for social enterprise realities in a specific context.

This paper focuses on the individual level and provides rare insights into social entrepreneurs’ rationale, values and identities.

Entrepreneurial intention plays a major role in entrepreneurship academia and practice. However, little is known about the intentions of entrepreneurs in the social area of venture creation. This paper aims to formulate a well-organized model of social entrepreneurial intention.

The paper draws on intention models in entrepreneurship literature in general and social entrepreneurship in particular to identify gaps. Based on these findings, a new conceptual model is formulated.

There is no research to be found which uses the social cognitive career theory (SCCT) to explain about an individual’s intention to become a social entrepreneur, although this theory is recently suggested as an inclusive framework for entrepreneurial intention (Doan Winkel et al., 2011). It is also supportive by the empirical research of Segal et al. (2002). Therefore, a conceptual model of entrepreneurial intention in the field of social entrepreneurship is formulated based on adapting and extending the SCCT.

The paper contributes to the social entrepreneurship literature by providing new insights about social entrepreneurial intention. The result has important implications for theory and practice. In theory, it is the first model offering the SCCT as the background of formation for social entrepreneurial intention, with a distinct perspective of social entrepreneurship as a career. It raises a future direction for researchers to test this model. In practice, this framework provides a broad view of factors that could contribute to the success of the would-be a social entrepreneur.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of entrepreneurs’ social competence (SC) on small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) performance.

Primary data of 250 manufacturing SMEs were collected through a survey method. The influence of SC on performance was tested using structural equation modelling (SEM).

Overall, the findings suggest that SC dimensions have a positive influence on SME performance in terms of nonfinancial perspective. More clearly, the findings show that out of five dimensions of SC, which include social adaptability, social perception, social expressiveness, persuasiveness and impression management; social perception, persuasiveness and impression management have direct effect on customer perspective; persuasiveness, social expressiveness and social adaptability have a direct influence on internal business processes and social adaptability, social perception, impression management and social expressiveness are directly related with learning and growth. Contrary to expectations though, social perception and social adaptability were significantly and negatively associated with internal business processes and customer perspective, respectively, while there was no significant correlation between social expressiveness, persuasiveness and impression management with customer perspective, business processes and learning and growth in that order.

The current study affirms that SMEs managed by entrepreneurs and managers who possess high levels of SC, may have a better performance compared to those operated by entrepreneurs with low levels of SC. This justifies a need for SME entrepreneurs and managers to work hard to improve their SC capabilities.

This study is pertinent and unique because, it extensively examines each of the five dimensions of SC in relation to nonfinancial indicators of SME performance. Besides, the study also provides additional evidence of the impact of SC on SME performance by suggesting that entrepreneurs who are socially competent are more likely to own highly successful ventures.

Small social entrepreneurs (SSEs) who operate in resource-constrained environments frequently use entrepreneurial bricolage (EB) to overcome such limitations. Research in social entrepreneurship mainly focuses on the outcomes of bricolage, with little knowledge about individual mechanisms that lead SSEs to use this approach. The authors fill this gap by investigating the role of entrepreneurial passion in fostering bricolage and the mediating effect of the sense of community.

To validate the theoretical model, the authors surveyed 279 SSEs operating in 7 African countries. The authors assessed the risk of common method bias, internal reliability and the validity of constructs and tested the hypotheses by performing linear regression analysis.

This study’s results demonstrate that passionate SSEs operating in resource-constrained contexts develop a sense of community by perceiving it as a valuable resource provider and that sense of community moves them to engage with EB.

Within the field of social entrepreneurship, this study examines the importance of a sense of community among SSEs; this evidence opens new avenues for research on drivers of small businesses operating in developing economies.

This study has practical implications for SSEs on implementing bricolage, and guidelines for governments, policymakers and NGOs in better developing their policies and programs considering the role of communities.

This study contributes to the literature by highlighting individual-level drivers of bricolage for SSEs operating in resource constraints, and revealing the relevance of the subjective view of the role of the community.

The creation of positive social change (PSC) is considered the primary success criterion when evaluating social enterprise performance. However, despite a proliferation of PSC-measurements, their empirical validity and applicability in emerging economies remain largely unclear. The quantitative study examines the validity of the PSC-measurement approaches proposed by Bloom and Smith (2010; Bloom and Smith approach [BSA]) and Weaver (2020b; Weaver approach [WA]) in South Africa.

Investigating a representative sample of 347 social entrepreneurs from Gauteng and Limpopo provinces, the authors use questionnaire data to explore the factorial, convergent and discriminant validity of both PSC-measurement approaches. Statistically, this is done by applying factorial and correlation analyses.

The results yield acknowledgeable differences. BSA has a high factorial and convergent validity, while its discriminant validity remains doubtful. For WA, problems concerning factorial validity occur.

Despite limited generalizability, the authors provide a first guideline for scholars regarding the empirical validity of BSA and WA outside the context of developed economies.

The current study sheds light on the validity of two PSC-measurement approaches in an emerging economy context. This way, the authors contribute to the field by addressing the scarcity of empirical research and the restricted scope of developed economies regarding PSC-measurement.