Pub Date : 2025-06-24DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106519
Jordan J. McSweeney , Kevin T. McSweeney , Thomas H. Allison , Aaron H. Anglin
Entrepreneurial pitching research has grown substantially over the last several decades. Despite this growth, prior research remains highly fragmented leaving us with a lack of conceptual clarity regarding what entrepreneurial pitching entails and how it unfolds over time. To address these issues, we conduct a systematic literature review of 173 articles examining entrepreneurial pitching from 2000 until 2024. Our review offers three important contributions to the entrepreneurship literature. First, we develop a process model of entrepreneurial pitching that provides a more holistic understanding of how entrepreneurial pitching unfolds over time by categorizing the 15 topics we identified into four stages: Pre-Pitch, Pitching, Post-Pitch, and Evaluation. Second, we leverage our review and integrative process model of entrepreneurial pitching to provide a roadmap to help guide future research. Third, we develop an integrative definition of entrepreneurial pitching that can conceptually anchor future studies.
{"title":"The entrepreneurial pitching process: A systematic review using topic modeling and future research agenda","authors":"Jordan J. McSweeney , Kevin T. McSweeney , Thomas H. Allison , Aaron H. Anglin","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106519","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106519","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Entrepreneurial pitching research has grown substantially over the last several decades. Despite this growth, prior research remains highly fragmented leaving us with a lack of conceptual clarity regarding what entrepreneurial pitching entails and how it unfolds over time. To address these issues, we conduct a systematic literature review of 173 articles examining entrepreneurial pitching from 2000 until 2024. Our review offers three important contributions to the entrepreneurship literature. First, we develop a process model of entrepreneurial pitching that provides a more holistic understanding of how entrepreneurial pitching unfolds over time by categorizing the 15 topics we identified into four stages: Pre-Pitch, Pitching, Post-Pitch, and Evaluation. Second, we leverage our review and integrative process model of entrepreneurial pitching to provide a roadmap to help guide future research. Third, we develop an integrative definition of entrepreneurial pitching that can conceptually anchor future studies.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 5","pages":"Article 106519"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-06-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144365399","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-06-04DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106504
Zhiyan Wu , Lucia Naldi
This study investigates whether and how female directors influence the performance of male-led new ventures. Guided by resource dependence theory, which sees boards as providers of key resources and advice, we shift the focus adopted in prior research on female directors' strategic roles in public firms to argue that, in male-led new ventures, their influence is more operationally focused. Using data from Sweden and an instrumental variable approach that exploits the random assignment of a child's sex at birth among male founders, we find that greater female board representation is positively associated with the performance of male-led new ventures. Further analyses suggest this effect operates primarily through workforce development—namely, the hiring of skilled female employees and the provision of competitive compensation. Notably, even a single female director has a measurable impact. This study underscores the distinct role of female directors in entrepreneurial settings as opposed to established firms, illuminating the mechanisms through which female presence in the boardroom positively affects the early life stages of organizations. We hope our research serves as a basis for future research to explore further the roles played by female directors that are particularly relevant at the startup stage.
{"title":"Developing the workforce: Exploring the impact of female directors on male-led new ventures","authors":"Zhiyan Wu , Lucia Naldi","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106504","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106504","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study investigates whether and how female directors influence the performance of male-led new ventures. Guided by resource dependence theory, which sees boards as providers of key resources and advice, we shift the focus adopted in prior research on female directors' strategic roles in public firms to argue that, in male-led new ventures, their influence is more operationally focused. Using data from Sweden and an instrumental variable approach that exploits the random assignment of a child's sex at birth among male founders, we find that greater female board representation is positively associated with the performance of male-led new ventures. Further analyses suggest this effect operates primarily through workforce development—namely, the hiring of skilled female employees and the provision of competitive compensation. Notably, even a single female director has a measurable impact. This study underscores the distinct role of female directors in entrepreneurial settings as opposed to established firms, illuminating the mechanisms through which female presence in the boardroom positively affects the early life stages of organizations. We hope our research serves as a basis for future research to explore further the roles played by female directors that are particularly relevant at the startup stage.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 5","pages":"Article 106504"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-06-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144212460","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-05-31DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106512
Marco van Gelderen
Research on how to slow, halt, and reverse aging processes is making progress. Pharmaceutical, big-tech, and venture capital companies and their owners are making considerable investments in potential (epi)genetic, molecular, cellular, and organ-based interventions and therapies. This essay considers implications for entrepreneurship in the case that such interventions would eventually result in a doubling of the human healthspan. A vastly extended middle age would imply potential changes in opportunities, the future time perspective of entrepreneurs, the pace of time as experienced by entrepreneurs, and the relationship between age and entrepreneurial success. The essay also outlines a range of wider considerations. The final section ties the essay together by discussing how entrepreneurship scholarship can help move the longevity domain forward.
{"title":"Living healthily to 120: Implications for entrepreneurship","authors":"Marco van Gelderen","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106512","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106512","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Research on how to slow, halt, and reverse aging processes is making progress. Pharmaceutical, big-tech, and venture capital companies and their owners are making considerable investments in potential (<em>epi</em>)genetic, molecular, cellular, and organ-based interventions and therapies. This essay considers implications for entrepreneurship in the case that such interventions would eventually result in a doubling of the human healthspan. A vastly extended middle age would imply potential changes in opportunities, the future time perspective of entrepreneurs, the pace of time as experienced by entrepreneurs, and the relationship between age and entrepreneurial success. The essay also outlines a range of wider considerations. The final section ties the essay together by discussing how entrepreneurship scholarship can help move the longevity domain forward.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 4","pages":"Article 106512"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144178014","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-05-30DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106511
Theodore L. Waldron , Jeffery S. McMullen , Scott L. Newbert , G. Tyge Payne , Jeffrey G. York
Entrepreneurship research should strive for relevance—the potential to influence the thoughts, decisions, and actions of those who practice entrepreneurship. Despite the Journal of Business Venturing’s (JBV) efforts to foster relevance, submissions often fail to demonstrate their potential for practical usefulness. Addressing this problem involves making practical relevance a guiding principle of research design that complements traditional academic standards for publishing in JBV. It also involves forgoing attempts to make research directly usable by practitioners, who rarely read scholarly journals like JBV, in favor of enhancing its suitability for translation in outlets intended for those audiences. We introduce three design criteria—importance, insight, and impact—to guide the creation of translatable research that honors traditional academic standards. Our discussion touches on what the design criteria mean, how they make research translatable, how scholars can satisfy them, what they look like in exemplar JBV publications, and why they matter now. Indeed, designing research with practical importance, insight, and impact in mind may yield academic contributions more suitable for dissemination beyond academic circles, positioning entrepreneurship research to achieve practical relevance.
{"title":"Bold, broad, rigorous, and…relevant? Designing entrepreneurship research for translation","authors":"Theodore L. Waldron , Jeffery S. McMullen , Scott L. Newbert , G. Tyge Payne , Jeffrey G. York","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106511","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106511","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Entrepreneurship research should strive for relevance—the potential to influence the thoughts, decisions, and actions of those who practice entrepreneurship. Despite the Journal of Business Venturing’s (JBV) efforts to foster relevance, submissions often fail to demonstrate their potential for practical usefulness. Addressing this problem involves making practical relevance a guiding principle of research design that complements traditional academic standards for publishing in JBV. It also involves forgoing attempts to make research directly usable by practitioners, who rarely read scholarly journals like JBV, in favor of enhancing its suitability for translation in outlets intended for those audiences. We introduce three design criteria—importance, insight, and impact—to guide the creation of translatable research that honors traditional academic standards. Our discussion touches on what the design criteria mean, how they make research translatable, how scholars can satisfy them, what they look like in exemplar JBV publications, and why they matter now. Indeed, designing research with practical importance, insight, and impact in mind may yield academic contributions more suitable for dissemination beyond academic circles, positioning entrepreneurship research to achieve practical relevance.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 4","pages":"Article 106511"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-05-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144168690","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-05-29DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106507
Sarah R. Chase, Dean A. Shepherd
<div><div>While the entrepreneurship literature has explored distinct types of opportunities, such as sustainable, unsustainable, social, and commercial, the diverse and integrated processes through which each type of opportunity is exploited remain poorly understood. Indeed, prior research tends to conceptualize opportunity exploitation as uniform and binary, such as sustainable or unsustainable, rather than as a set of dynamic processes and activities shaped by local contexts. Through an inductive study of the South African abalone industry, we explore entrepreneurial variants—differentiated processes and activities of opportunity exploitation—offering a framework for identifying and interpreting the integrated mechanisms through which opportunities are exploited within a local system. We found that the community members perceive that these entrepreneurial variants generate two primary dynamics: pernicious dynamics (i.e., processes that community members believe diminish the functioning of the community) and symbiotic dynamics (i.e., processes that community members believe enhance the functioning of the community). We shed light on how a local system comprises multiple entrepreneurial variants, each embodying distinct relationships with and implications for the local ecology, people, and place. We also offer insights into when mostly unsustainable entrepreneurship can involve symbiotic dynamics and when mostly sustainable entrepreneurship can involve pernicious dynamics. We conclude by discussing the implications for both entrepreneurship theory and practice.</div></div><div><h3>Executive summary</h3><div>Opportunity exploitation is a core element of entrepreneurship. Scholars have recently begun investigating unsustainable entrepreneurship, where entrepreneurs exploit opportunities in ways that cause harm to the natural environment. Scholars have also examined sustainable entrepreneurship, where entrepreneurs exploit opportunities that generate solutions to diminish the harm caused to the natural environment. Indeed, much of the existing entrepreneurship literature has relied on binary constructions, such as the exploitation of sustainable <em>or</em> unsustainable opportunities or of social <em>or</em> commercial opportunities. These constructions largely focus on singular underlying processes and outcomes of opportunity exploitation, offering limited insights into how opportunity exploitation may involve multiple, overlapping, or even conflicting processes and activities within a local system.</div><div>Thus, while prior research has often conceptualized opportunity exploitation in static and binary terms, a deeper understanding of the dynamic, context-dependent processes and activities through which opportunities are exploited remains elusive. In particular, we lack a structured framework to examine the underlying interconnected processes and activities of opportunity exploitation. Advancing such a framework would allow scholars and practi
{"title":"Waves and rips: Abalone, entrepreneurial variants, and community functioning","authors":"Sarah R. Chase, Dean A. Shepherd","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106507","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106507","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>While the entrepreneurship literature has explored distinct types of opportunities, such as sustainable, unsustainable, social, and commercial, the diverse and integrated processes through which each type of opportunity is exploited remain poorly understood. Indeed, prior research tends to conceptualize opportunity exploitation as uniform and binary, such as sustainable or unsustainable, rather than as a set of dynamic processes and activities shaped by local contexts. Through an inductive study of the South African abalone industry, we explore entrepreneurial variants—differentiated processes and activities of opportunity exploitation—offering a framework for identifying and interpreting the integrated mechanisms through which opportunities are exploited within a local system. We found that the community members perceive that these entrepreneurial variants generate two primary dynamics: pernicious dynamics (i.e., processes that community members believe diminish the functioning of the community) and symbiotic dynamics (i.e., processes that community members believe enhance the functioning of the community). We shed light on how a local system comprises multiple entrepreneurial variants, each embodying distinct relationships with and implications for the local ecology, people, and place. We also offer insights into when mostly unsustainable entrepreneurship can involve symbiotic dynamics and when mostly sustainable entrepreneurship can involve pernicious dynamics. We conclude by discussing the implications for both entrepreneurship theory and practice.</div></div><div><h3>Executive summary</h3><div>Opportunity exploitation is a core element of entrepreneurship. Scholars have recently begun investigating unsustainable entrepreneurship, where entrepreneurs exploit opportunities in ways that cause harm to the natural environment. Scholars have also examined sustainable entrepreneurship, where entrepreneurs exploit opportunities that generate solutions to diminish the harm caused to the natural environment. Indeed, much of the existing entrepreneurship literature has relied on binary constructions, such as the exploitation of sustainable <em>or</em> unsustainable opportunities or of social <em>or</em> commercial opportunities. These constructions largely focus on singular underlying processes and outcomes of opportunity exploitation, offering limited insights into how opportunity exploitation may involve multiple, overlapping, or even conflicting processes and activities within a local system.</div><div>Thus, while prior research has often conceptualized opportunity exploitation in static and binary terms, a deeper understanding of the dynamic, context-dependent processes and activities through which opportunities are exploited remains elusive. In particular, we lack a structured framework to examine the underlying interconnected processes and activities of opportunity exploitation. Advancing such a framework would allow scholars and practi","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 4","pages":"Article 106507"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-05-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144168691","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-05-26DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106509
Jeroen Neckebrouck , William S. Schulze
Despite the ubiquity of private firms, questions concerning the influence of ownermanagement and board governance on strategic decision-making in private firms have received limited attention. To explore these questions, we draw on the performance feedback literature and use longitudinal data from 27,704 U.K. and 7272 Belgian private firms to examine strategic investment in private firms. We find that board oversight increases the likelihood that firms will adjust investment levels in line with predictions by the Behavioral Theory of the Firm (BTOF), as firms with high board oversight increase investment when performance falls below aspirations and reduce it when performance exceeds aspirations. In contrast, low board oversight is associated with deviations from BTOF predictions, as firms with low board oversight tend to reduce investment when performance is below aspirations but increase it even when performance is well above aspirations. These findings suggest that governed (high oversight) and ungoverned (low oversight) private firms follow different decisionmaking logics; governed firms appear to engage in coalition-based decision-making, while decision-making in ungoverned firms appears to be dominated by ownermanagers, whose investment preferences resemble those of risk-averse, undiversified investors. We also find that the relationship between owner-management, performance feedback, and strategic investment is tempered (offset) by board oversight. In sum, our findings indicate boards play a critical role in private firms by promoting collective goals (as identified and enacted by the board) and limiting the influence of owner-manager's personal goals, risk-preferences, and individual economic interests on the firm's response to performance feedback.
{"title":"Owner-management, board governance and responses to performance feedback in private firms","authors":"Jeroen Neckebrouck , William S. Schulze","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106509","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106509","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Despite the ubiquity of private firms, questions concerning the influence of ownermanagement and board governance on strategic decision-making in private firms have received limited attention. To explore these questions, we draw on the performance feedback literature and use longitudinal data from 27,704 U.K. and 7272 Belgian private firms to examine strategic investment in private firms. We find that board oversight increases the likelihood that firms will adjust investment levels in line with predictions by the Behavioral Theory of the Firm (BTOF), as firms with high board oversight increase investment when performance falls below aspirations and reduce it when performance exceeds aspirations. In contrast, low board oversight is associated with deviations from BTOF predictions, as firms with low board oversight tend to reduce investment when performance is below aspirations but increase it even when performance is well above aspirations. These findings suggest that governed (high oversight) and ungoverned (low oversight) private firms follow different decisionmaking logics; governed firms appear to engage in coalition-based decision-making, while decision-making in ungoverned firms appears to be dominated by ownermanagers, whose investment preferences resemble those of risk-averse, undiversified investors. We also find that the relationship between owner-management, performance feedback, and strategic investment is tempered (offset) by board oversight. In sum, our findings indicate boards play a critical role in private firms by promoting collective goals (as identified and enacted by the board) and limiting the influence of owner-manager's personal goals, risk-preferences, and individual economic interests on the firm's response to performance feedback.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 4","pages":"Article 106509"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-05-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144138009","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-05-20DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106508
Arielle Newman , Alexander Lewis , Ryan Coles
<div><div>This study explores emancipatory entrepreneurship in postcolonial economies where Western bureaucratic and Indigenous traditional systems simultaneously influence entrepreneurial activities. In Kumasi Ghana, the reconstruction of the Kejetia Marketplace was funded by foreign investment and required formal business registration, effectively excluding informal entrepreneurs. Using process tracing, we analyze how informal entrepreneurs leveraged various forms of Indigenous capital and engaged interstitial actors to convert it into actionable capital within the Western system. This process enabled them to overcome their initial exclusion as they built a series of emancipatory structures, culminating in the elimination of the constraint of formalization in the New Kejetia and opening new opportunities for inclusion. Our findings reveal the significance of Indigenous systems in navigating bureaucratic constraints, contributing to the emancipatory entrepreneurship literature by showing how postcolonial contexts both motivate and shape the emancipatory efforts of marginalized entrepreneurs.</div></div><div><h3>Executive summary</h3><div>This study explores emancipatory entrepreneurship in postcolonial economies, contexts where both a Western bureaucratic institutional system and Indigenous traditional institutional system influence entrepreneurial activities. Emancipatory entrepreneurship involves overcoming constraints, often faced by marginalized groups seeking to improve their structural positions. In Kumasi Ghana, our central case study, the reconstruction of the Kejetia Marketplace was funded by foreign investment and required formal business registration. This policy excluded petty traders who lacked formal property rights. Using process tracing, we analyze how these entrepreneurs leveraged various forms of Indigenous capital, and by engaging interstitial actors, transformed it into effective action in the Western system. This process enabled them to overcome their initial exclusion as they built a series of emancipatory structures, culminating in the elimination of the constraint of formalization in the New Kejetia and making new opportunities accessible to petty traders. Our findings reveal the significance of Indigenous systems in navigating bureaucratic constraints, contributing to the emancipatory entrepreneurship literature by showing how postcolonial contexts both motivate and shape the emancipatory efforts of marginalized entrepreneurs. We contribute to emancipatory entrepreneurship literature by highlighting the role of Indigenous perspectives in understanding entrepreneurial agency in postcolonial settings. We offer insights into how Indigenous actors respond to bureaucratic constraints through emancipatory actions, emphasizing community well-being alongside profit and efficiency. Additionally, we position colonial legacies as central to analyzing entrepreneurial activity, providing generalizable insights into the dynamic intera
{"title":"Emancipatory entrepreneurship in postcolonial economies: The clash of institutional systems in the Kejetia marketplace","authors":"Arielle Newman , Alexander Lewis , Ryan Coles","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106508","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106508","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study explores emancipatory entrepreneurship in postcolonial economies where Western bureaucratic and Indigenous traditional systems simultaneously influence entrepreneurial activities. In Kumasi Ghana, the reconstruction of the Kejetia Marketplace was funded by foreign investment and required formal business registration, effectively excluding informal entrepreneurs. Using process tracing, we analyze how informal entrepreneurs leveraged various forms of Indigenous capital and engaged interstitial actors to convert it into actionable capital within the Western system. This process enabled them to overcome their initial exclusion as they built a series of emancipatory structures, culminating in the elimination of the constraint of formalization in the New Kejetia and opening new opportunities for inclusion. Our findings reveal the significance of Indigenous systems in navigating bureaucratic constraints, contributing to the emancipatory entrepreneurship literature by showing how postcolonial contexts both motivate and shape the emancipatory efforts of marginalized entrepreneurs.</div></div><div><h3>Executive summary</h3><div>This study explores emancipatory entrepreneurship in postcolonial economies, contexts where both a Western bureaucratic institutional system and Indigenous traditional institutional system influence entrepreneurial activities. Emancipatory entrepreneurship involves overcoming constraints, often faced by marginalized groups seeking to improve their structural positions. In Kumasi Ghana, our central case study, the reconstruction of the Kejetia Marketplace was funded by foreign investment and required formal business registration. This policy excluded petty traders who lacked formal property rights. Using process tracing, we analyze how these entrepreneurs leveraged various forms of Indigenous capital, and by engaging interstitial actors, transformed it into effective action in the Western system. This process enabled them to overcome their initial exclusion as they built a series of emancipatory structures, culminating in the elimination of the constraint of formalization in the New Kejetia and making new opportunities accessible to petty traders. Our findings reveal the significance of Indigenous systems in navigating bureaucratic constraints, contributing to the emancipatory entrepreneurship literature by showing how postcolonial contexts both motivate and shape the emancipatory efforts of marginalized entrepreneurs. We contribute to emancipatory entrepreneurship literature by highlighting the role of Indigenous perspectives in understanding entrepreneurial agency in postcolonial settings. We offer insights into how Indigenous actors respond to bureaucratic constraints through emancipatory actions, emphasizing community well-being alongside profit and efficiency. Additionally, we position colonial legacies as central to analyzing entrepreneurial activity, providing generalizable insights into the dynamic intera","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 4","pages":"Article 106508"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144098894","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-05-16DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106506
Christian E. Hampel , Elena Dalpiaz
Hyped ventures attract valuable resources by framing their goals in line with the hype. However, in doing so they risk adopting problematic conduct that undermines their moral legitimacy and requires repair. To explore the overlooked internal dynamics of this phenomenon, we conduct a longitudinal case study of a hyped fintech venture that lost and repaired its legitimacy. Our paper uncovers that how hyped ventures frame the moral boundaries of the pursuit of growth influences their conduct and, in turn, facilitates the loss or repair of their legitimacy. Two dynamics underline this process: the activation of intense emotions among employees and the entrenchment of distinct organizational cultures. Importantly, our study reveals that when ventures are hyped, a “growth at all costs” frame risks kindling “antagonistic excitement” among employees and facilitating a “hubristic culture” that supports morally reckless practices. By shedding light on these dynamics within hyped ventures, our study contributes to scholarship on entrepreneurial framing, cultural entrepreneurship, and tech venture legitimacy.
{"title":"When hype collides with morality: How entrepreneurial framing affects the behavior and legitimacy of hyped ventures","authors":"Christian E. Hampel , Elena Dalpiaz","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106506","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106506","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Hyped ventures attract valuable resources by framing their goals in line with the hype. However, in doing so they risk adopting problematic conduct that undermines their moral legitimacy and requires repair. To explore the overlooked internal dynamics of this phenomenon, we conduct a longitudinal case study of a hyped fintech venture that lost and repaired its legitimacy. Our paper uncovers that how hyped ventures frame the moral boundaries of the pursuit of growth influences their conduct and, in turn, facilitates the loss or repair of their legitimacy. Two dynamics underline this process: the activation of intense emotions among employees and the entrenchment of distinct organizational cultures. Importantly, our study reveals that when ventures are hyped, a “growth at all costs” frame risks kindling “antagonistic excitement” among employees and facilitating a “hubristic culture” that supports morally reckless practices. By shedding light on these dynamics within hyped ventures, our study contributes to scholarship on entrepreneurial framing, cultural entrepreneurship, and tech venture legitimacy.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 4","pages":"Article 106506"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-05-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144069428","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-04-30DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106502
Rui Agostinho , Rui Baptista , Jolanda Hessels , Hugo Castro-Silva , Peter van der Zwan
<div><div>The present paper argues and tests the proposition that firms with older top and middle managers produce fewer entrepreneurs, because these firms offer less chances to their employees to enter managerial positions that provide valuable experience for entrepreneurship (rank effect theory). Empirical work using linked employer-employee microdata for Portugal support this. The rank effect is stronger in firms with older top managers. Employees who progress slower into managerial ranks are not pushed into entrepreneurship but are more likely to take on jobs as employees in other firms. Overall, our results suggest that firms with younger management ranks offer more chances for workers to enter managerial positions and, therefore, spawn more entrepreneurs.</div></div><div><h3>Executive summary</h3><div>A common career pathway leading towards entrepreneurship materializes through gaining experience working as a wage employee. In particular, work in top and middle management roles involving leadership and responsibility for strategic decisions should provide experience, knowledge and networks that are valuable for entrepreneurship. Founders of prominent unicorns and start-up ventures throughout the world have acquired significant managerial experience.</div><div>Top and middle management roles often involve tasks that demand a broad range of skills associated with obtaining and deploying resources, as well as organizing and managing people. Furthermore, top and middle managerial positions expose individuals to ample opportunities for obtaining new knowledge and learning, including knowledge about new business opportunities.</div><div>A recent theory named the rank effect suggests that in societies with older workforces, younger workers are less likely to become entrepreneurs because they are unable to acquire the experience and skills required for entrepreneurship. In aging societies, top and middle managers are more likely to be older and hold on to their positions for longer, thereby blocking younger subordinates from reaching managerial ranks. Since younger people are more likely to possess the energy, creativity, risk-taking and innovative abilities that enable and motivate entrepreneurs, if fewer young employees hold top and middle managerial ranks (so they can acquire essential experience), entrepreneurship rates will likely decline.</div><div>Arguably, the rank effect argument overlooks that, if workers are indeed blocked from progressing to managerial positions in firms with older workforces and managers, frustration caused by lack of career advancement may also lead them to leave, either by seeking employment in another firm, or possibly by becoming entrepreneurs themselves. If non-managerial workers frustrated with lack of career progress are more likely to become entrepreneurs, the basic argument of rank theory – that managerial experience is a vital determinant of entrepreneurial ability and motivation – is significantly weakened.<
{"title":"The entrepreneurship fountain of youth: Younger management ranks generate more entrepreneurs","authors":"Rui Agostinho , Rui Baptista , Jolanda Hessels , Hugo Castro-Silva , Peter van der Zwan","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106502","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106502","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The present paper argues and tests the proposition that firms with older top and middle managers produce fewer entrepreneurs, because these firms offer less chances to their employees to enter managerial positions that provide valuable experience for entrepreneurship (rank effect theory). Empirical work using linked employer-employee microdata for Portugal support this. The rank effect is stronger in firms with older top managers. Employees who progress slower into managerial ranks are not pushed into entrepreneurship but are more likely to take on jobs as employees in other firms. Overall, our results suggest that firms with younger management ranks offer more chances for workers to enter managerial positions and, therefore, spawn more entrepreneurs.</div></div><div><h3>Executive summary</h3><div>A common career pathway leading towards entrepreneurship materializes through gaining experience working as a wage employee. In particular, work in top and middle management roles involving leadership and responsibility for strategic decisions should provide experience, knowledge and networks that are valuable for entrepreneurship. Founders of prominent unicorns and start-up ventures throughout the world have acquired significant managerial experience.</div><div>Top and middle management roles often involve tasks that demand a broad range of skills associated with obtaining and deploying resources, as well as organizing and managing people. Furthermore, top and middle managerial positions expose individuals to ample opportunities for obtaining new knowledge and learning, including knowledge about new business opportunities.</div><div>A recent theory named the rank effect suggests that in societies with older workforces, younger workers are less likely to become entrepreneurs because they are unable to acquire the experience and skills required for entrepreneurship. In aging societies, top and middle managers are more likely to be older and hold on to their positions for longer, thereby blocking younger subordinates from reaching managerial ranks. Since younger people are more likely to possess the energy, creativity, risk-taking and innovative abilities that enable and motivate entrepreneurs, if fewer young employees hold top and middle managerial ranks (so they can acquire essential experience), entrepreneurship rates will likely decline.</div><div>Arguably, the rank effect argument overlooks that, if workers are indeed blocked from progressing to managerial positions in firms with older workforces and managers, frustration caused by lack of career advancement may also lead them to leave, either by seeking employment in another firm, or possibly by becoming entrepreneurs themselves. If non-managerial workers frustrated with lack of career progress are more likely to become entrepreneurs, the basic argument of rank theory – that managerial experience is a vital determinant of entrepreneurial ability and motivation – is significantly weakened.<","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 4","pages":"Article 106502"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143886445","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-04-26DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106505
April J. Spivack , Tom Lahti , Thommie Burström , Joakim Wincent
Drawing on a qualitative case study of hype around an entrepreneurial venture, we develop a three-phase process model detailing how firm-level hype influences volatility in perceived legitimacy. We detail how hype over a new venture's practices, including coupling and decoupling, may boost legitimacy in the short term, but may also lead to long-term risks of accelerated legitimacy loss. Positively, hype amplifies excitement over new business models that may use decoupling to solve existing problems in new ways, thereby rapidly inflating perceived legitimacy. Negatively, hype triggers moral questioning, whistleblowing, and moral panicking over decoupled practices that contradict core institutional logics, thereby accelerating perceived legitimacy loss. We highlight the dynamism and intensity of hype's influence on perceived legitimacy and question the viability of decoupling as a long-term strategy for new ventures in contexts of institutional pluralism.
{"title":"Legitimacy perceptions amid institutional pluralism: How hype over decoupled practices influences entrepreneurial ventures","authors":"April J. Spivack , Tom Lahti , Thommie Burström , Joakim Wincent","doi":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106505","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jbusvent.2025.106505","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Drawing on a qualitative case study of hype around an entrepreneurial venture, we develop a three-phase process model detailing how firm-level hype influences volatility in perceived legitimacy. We detail how hype over a new venture's practices, including coupling and decoupling, may boost legitimacy in the short term, but may also lead to long-term risks of accelerated legitimacy loss. Positively, hype amplifies excitement over new business models that may use decoupling to solve existing problems in new ways, thereby rapidly inflating perceived legitimacy. Negatively, hype triggers moral questioning, whistleblowing, and moral panicking over decoupled practices that contradict core institutional logics, thereby accelerating perceived legitimacy loss. We highlight the dynamism and intensity of hype's influence on perceived legitimacy and question the viability of decoupling as a long-term strategy for new ventures in contexts of institutional pluralism.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":51348,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Business Venturing","volume":"40 4","pages":"Article 106505"},"PeriodicalIF":7.7,"publicationDate":"2025-04-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143874370","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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