Journal of Business Venturing最新文献

Entrepreneurial passion is socially contagious. However, do entrepreneurs also select whom they interact with based on passion similarity? The complex interdependencies between social networks and entrepreneurial passion remain undertheorized and empirically puzzling. Using a stochastic actor-oriented model (SIENA) and four waves of panel data, we test hypotheses about the co-evolution of social networks and entrepreneurial passion during a 5-month startup accelerator program. We observe that social ties occur more frequently among peer entrepreneurs who are similar in levels of passion for founding. Initial homophily selection explains 34% of this observed similarity whereas social contagion explains 57%. Finally, we find that passion for founding is more contagious among members of startup teams than across other peer ties. Surprisingly, none of these effects are significant for passion for inventing. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

In this paper, we address a thorny challenge: how can entrepreneurship scholarship enhance its impact without compromising the pursuit of conceptual rigor and theoretical novelty? We propose a prospective inquiry framework for entrepreneurship. It aims to align the scholarly pursuit of theoretical novelty with the entrepreneurs' focus on the future, in a shared aspiration to make a difference in the world. By expanding the focus of theoretical work toward the future, scholarship can focus on the formulation, exploration, and evaluation of alternatives to the present, as theories for desired futures. Prospective inquiry retains the primacy of theorizing while expanding its purpose, value, and use in entrepreneurship research, unleashing its generative power. It opens new spaces for theoretical excellence, dissolves the research-practice gap, and allows researchers and practitioners to theorize and enact their aspirations for the future.

Despite increasing interest in the narratives of entrepreneurial failure, the understanding of how entrepreneurs reconstruct their identity as they advance from experiences of failure to new ventures remains partial. Based on a narrative analysis of 49 entrepreneurs' experiences, we uncover three narrative types used by entrepreneurs when moving on: shielding, transformation, and authenticity. In particular, we elaborate on how the entrepreneurs employ specific discursive practices in their narratives to deal with three central aspects of identity reconstruction: construction of responsibility, identity transition, and identity validation. Thus, our analysis elucidates the narrative underpinnings of dealing with failure and deepens our understanding of entrepreneurial identity construction in the context of moving on.

Studies argue that macroeconomic contractions create immediate incentives for individuals to pursue entrepreneurship. However, research has not addressed whether past macroeconomic contractions imprint on individuals and influence their future entrepreneurship. Integrating literature on the business cycle and imprinting with insights from lifespan psychology, we develop and test competing theoretical arguments aligned to two distinct life stages about when a macroeconomic contraction will imprint on individuals to influence their future entrepreneurship, and how such effects are imprinted. Our findings show that only contractions experienced during early adulthood influence entrepreneurship and this effect is transmitted culturally via country-level preferences for time discounting.

When launching their ventures, the majority of entrepreneurs are married. Yet, our understanding of the spousal influence on the entrepreneurial process remains limited. This is surprising considering the spouse represents one of the most influential figures in an individual's life. Through an inductive qualitative analysis of 18 spouse-entrepreneur pairs, we explore the interactive nature of venture-related roles between the spousal couple and how these spousal roles evolve over the course of the venture. Our study shows that the dynamic alignment between entrepreneurial roles and spousal roles allows the venture to progress through various stages of firm innovation, creation, and growth. Thus, our paper extends the broader literature on roles during the venturing process as we illuminate the “not-so-silent role” of spouses in entrepreneurship.

One of the major entrepreneurial challenges faced by scaling firms involves changing their internal organization. Our study focuses on a particular aspect of internal organizing—namely, how founder roles evolve in preparation for scaling. By means of an in-depth case study and a combination of data collection methods, we study the evolution of formal and informal founder roles. For both types of roles, we identify a founder-driven and an interaction-driven phase, during which founder and/or joiner role-crafting take place. Through both types of role-crafting, founder roles are (re)shaped. Particularly unique to our study is that we identify three scaling-specific paths through which the role-crafting of joiners shapes founders' roles. Specifically, founders experience a role efficiency increase as they take over some of the joiner-introduced role behaviors, or a role set decrease as joiners take over some of their (formal or informal) roles. We further point to the importance of psychological safety and value fit for successful joiner role-crafting to occur and for founder roles to change following founder-joiner interactions. Our study adds to the literatures on scaling and entrepreneurship as well as to role theory and role-crafting literature.

While an economic paradigm has been productive for entrepreneurship, religion has been proposed as an alternative rationality to advance research in our field. To extend a theological turn in entrepreneurship and identity research, our study inductively develops a conceptual model that explains how individuals navigate entrepreneurial identity threats based on the interaction between a relational identity with God (RIG) and an entrepreneurial identity to persist in entrepreneurial action. Our study suggests this can happen when entrepreneurs engage in inter-identity work mechanisms - affirming and humbling - to mitigate these identity threats. Specifically, a relational identity with God acts as a countervailing force to an entrepreneurial identity during times of identity threats to generate inter-identity meaning change, resulting in interidentity stability and entrepreneurial persistence. Through our study, we advance knowledge on the theological turn in entrepreneurship and identity by inductively developing theory on a new religious identity construct (RIG), elaborating theory of inter-identity work by shifting the focus from structural to content changes, and extending theory on entrepreneurial action, persistence, and well-being based on theological rather than economic considerations.

In this special issue, we aim to explore the topic of rationality and its manifestations in entrepreneurship. The six articles in this special issue cover a range of questions about rationality – what it is, where it comes from, how it influences decision-making as well as understanding contextual factors that influence it. Reflecting our call for submissions as well as the accepted articles included in this special issue, we recognize, but also depart from, rationality's origins in economics to provide a range of perspectives on rationality in the entrepreneurship process. We also discuss common themes and future research directions for the field.

We study the development of entrepreneurial motivation of participants in an Ecuadorian incubator. Using a narrative inquiry approach based on 41 interviews, we uncover how different modes of rootedness in distinct communities shape entrepreneurial dispositions and shed light on the role of a temporary community of practice in intermediating the development and ultimate transformation of these dispositions into individuated motivations. By bringing to the frontline the role of communities in shaping the formation process of entrepreneurial motivation, we offer a new theoretical angle for understanding intricate relations between social embeddedness, temporary communities of practice, and entrepreneurial pursuits in non-Western contexts.