Promoting Entrepreneurship:how risk capital companies and business incubators select their projects and how satisfied are they with their choices

Gaspar, Fernando

http://hdl.handle.net/10400.15/3074

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Gaspar, Fernando

Abstract(s)

Entrepreneurship has become an important subject for academics and for politicians all over the western world. Particularly for countries in the euro zone, whose ability to use demand side politics has been severely shortened, the need to improve economic growth through the stimulation of the aggregate supply is one of the priorities of these days. This paper looks for ways to convince people to use their abilities in an entrepreneurial career, by studying non-entrepreneurs and the reasons why they don’t want to go that way. Objectives: This communication takes data from a entrepreneurial intentions study and tries to identify differences between a) people who say they want to be entrepreneurs and b) people who clearly say they do not want to create their own organization. Prior work: A large number of studies have been published studying successful entrepreneurs. That means entrepreneurship literature looks at people who, not only decided to create their own companies, but also succeeded at that activity. The work of Gartner (1988) provided reasons to believe entrepreneurs are not different from other people in their psychological attributes. Most studies don’t look at people who created their own companies but failed. Much less do they look at people who do not create companies. Approach: This communication looks at people who flat out say they don’t want to be entrepreneurs. It tries to identify what distinguishes them from the ones who want to be entrepreneurs and it tries to answer the question: why? Why don’t they want to become entrepreneurs? Are they concerned they will not be successful? Do they believe they will not be able to gather the necessary resources? Are they unable to identify entrepreneurial opportunities? Do they think society does not value entrepreneur’s role? Results: The results show interesting suggestions about the reasons people resist the entrepreneurial idea. They seem to value obstacles more than potential entrepreneurs and they trust their capabilities less than them. People who do not want to be entrepreneurs seem to give less importance to professional development and to creating jobs. Implications: These results make one believe that people still see firm creation as a "big deal". For that reason they don't trust their capacities to be successful in entrepreneurship and choose other career options. Of course, there are also those who have other goals in life and don't see job creation or professional development as an important thing. These implications give political authorities directions on the policies they can use to develop entrepreneurship Value: Entrepreneurship has become an important subject for academics and for politicians all over the world. It is a reasonable assumption that increasing entrepreneurship is an important objective. The thing is HOW. What can governments do to increase the creation of new companies? Conclusions are drawn, concerning what governments, universities and other interface structures can do to change these people’s ideas about entrepreneurship.