Theories from the Lab: How Research on Science Commercialization can Contribute to Management Studies

Universities and research centres have long been used to study management issues. A growing body of research has focused on how science can be effectively commercialized, emphasizing technology commercialization activities, university–industry collaborations, and academic entrepreneurship. While much of this work has documented empirical relationships, our aim in this introductory article of the special issue is to show how research on science commercialization may yield conceptual contributions to the field of management. Hence, we first discuss the importance of context for theory development. We then review how the science commercialization context has been used for theory development, identifying two facets used to conceptualize science commercialization (i.e., managing the transition between institutional contexts, and the multiple goals and impacts of actors engaging in science commercialization). This forms the basis for discussing what makes this context suited for theory development in general management and for outlining a future research agenda. We conclude by summarizing the papers in the special issue.     

Embeddedness in context: understanding gender in a female entrepreneurship network

ABSTRACT

In this paper I argue that through a process of embeddedness in context, a female entrepreneurship network is able to challenge gender structures. I investigate how a female entrepreneurship network is constructed and how they reinforce and possibly challenge existing gender structures. From an ethnographic study, three processes in the female entrepreneurship network were identified: making proper entrepreneurs, building relationships and engaging in change. In the different processes the women involved in the network reinforced gender structures through compliance with a masculine discourse of entrepreneurship, but also challenged gender structures through questioning this discourse. Through becoming embedded in their local community, the women entrepreneurs were able to take charge of the development of the network and challenge gender structures as a result of questioning the masculine discourse of entrepreneurship. This implies an interplay between embeddedness and gender as two separate but dependent processes. Linking together gender and embeddedness elicits a new take on the way female entrepreneurship networks are constructed and how they could advance gender equality within entrepreneurship. Consequently, this paper emphasises a need for further examination of embeddedness within gender and entrepreneurship research.     

To each his own: Matching different entrepreneurial models to the academic scientist's individual needs

This paper presents a comparative case study of academic group leaders, active in three different scientific fields at a leading Swiss technical university. It examines the obstacles that prevent scientists from commercializing their technologies and how they can be reduced. Traditional models of technology transfer assume that scientists prefer either to 'go it alone' and become entrepreneurs (the inventor entrepreneur model) or to let go of their technologies to people interested in their commercialization (the surrogate entrepreneur model). The results of qualitative research suggest that these two models capture the extremes of a continuum populated by a variety of intermediate situations where scientists are unwilling completely to let go of their findings, but also do not want to become full time entrepreneurs. This results in considerable commercial potential that is unexploited. The Founding Angels approach might be a solution to this problem; it is designed for academics in these intermediate situations. The study contributes to the literature on university-industry technology transfer and should be useful for practitioners and scientists interested in maximizing the synergies between academia and industry.     

Growth intentions among research scientists: A cognitive style perspective

Although academic entrepreneurship has taken place in some U.S. universities for many decades, it is only over the past few decades that there has been an increased interest by universities worldwide to engage in their third mission related to entrepreneurship and economic development. Recently, researchers studying academic entrepreneurship have increasingly focused on understanding research scientists׳ entrepreneurial intentions. It has however also been acknowledged that, next to understanding entrepreneurial intentions, it is important to generate insights into growth intentions. This is because growth is unlikely to be achieved if no growth intention exists. Taking a cognition and self-efficacy perspective, our study explores how cognitive styles are associated with growth intentions within a group of research scientists having entrepreneurial intentions. Our study indicates that a planning cognitive style promotes while a knowing cognitive style curbs growth intentions. Further, working experience mitigates the negative impact of a knowing style on growth intentions. Our research has practical implications and implications for technology management, academic entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial intentions literatures.     

Defying contextual embeddedness: evidence from displaced women entrepreneurs in Jordan

ABSTRACT

Although entrepreneurial practices and processes are evolving and changing globally, models of entrepreneurship remain masculinized, embedded in advanced economies and associated with notions of individual agency, heroism and control. Rarely is defiance considered. In this paper, we explore the defiance practices of displaced women operating in the Jordanian patriarchal economy and society and consider how this enabled their nurturing of entrepreneurship. Indeed, we argue that socially excluded women actually defy their contextual embeddedness through their entrepreneurial activities. In so doing, we respond to calls for research that explores the contextual embeddedness of women’s entrepreneurship, and contribute to shifting the focus towards the more silent feminine end of the entrepreneurial process. We consider the defiance of invisible displaced women entrepreneurs operating in the under-researched context of Jordan. Longitudinal, ethnographic investigation revealed the creation of a secret production network led by, and for, displaced women. This paper focuses on the five founders of this network, which they established to mobilize and manage the production of traditional crafts and, by so doing, to defy the stifling limitations imposed by their restrictive contractors, community and family members.     

Guest editorial: Female and ethnic minority entrepreneurship

There has been an increasing level of interest in diversity in small business enterprises. This diversity has been largely focused on female and ethnic minority entrepreneurs. Although there is evidence that female entrepreneurship can have a positive impact on economic prosperity, levels of earnings remain low. The articles in this special issue further our understanding of female and minority entrepreneurs. They examine important topics such as the differences between male and female entrepreneurs in terms of confidence, growth expectations, entrepreneurial orientation and social capital, developing management skills in female entrepreneurs, their management competencies and refugee entrepreneurship.     

Logics,Leaders, Lab Coats: A Multi‐Level Study on How Institutional Logics are Linked to Entrepreneurial Intentions in Academia

Situated in the context of academia, this study integrates ideas from institutional theory, person‐environment fit theory and leadership research to conceptualize and examine the cross‐level link between the organizational‐level institutional logic of research commercialization and the entrepreneurial intentions of researchers. Multi‐level analyses based on a sample of 254 researchers working for 85 research group leaders in 49 German research institutes reveal that two distinct attributes of research group leaders – that is, their track records of entrepreneurial behaviour and their entrepreneurial intentions – play a significant role in transmitting the organizational‐level logic to the individual level. We also observe a complementary interaction between organizational‐level commercialization logic and the entrepreneurial track records of leaders. We discuss how these findings advance our understanding of science commercialization through academic entrepreneurship and how they inform institutional theory and theory development in other domains of entrepreneurship research.     

政府创业扶持政策对大学生创业的影响评价及其优化——基于浙江省的分析

创业扶持政策对大学生创业企业的产生与发展具有重大影响。然而,目前侧重于缓解大学生就业压力的创业扶持政策并不利于大学生创业企业的生存与发展,且严重破坏了大学生与其他非大学生创业者之间的公平竞争。应当对现行创业扶持政策进行反思,重新确定政策目标,完善创业扶持政策体系,建立创业失败者救助制度,将政策支持功能延伸到创业后期甚至是二次、三次创业阶段,并与其他中小企业扶持政策、法律形成紧密的衔接。     

Who am I? The influence of social identification on academic entrepreneurs’ role conflict

Academic entrepreneurs are the key actors in academic entrepreneurship. However, the individual level of research on academic entrepreneurship remains undeveloped. To better understand the micro foundation of academic entrepreneurship, we investigate the influence of social identification on academic entrepreneurs’ role conflict. Using data from 246 academic entrepreneurs, we explore the effects of scholarly identification, entrepreneurial identification, and social identity continuity on academic entrepreneurs’ role conflict. The results suggest that, entrepreneurial identification and social identify continuity are both negative related to identify conflict, while a scholarly identification is positively related to role conflict. In addition, the interaction of scholarly identification and entrepreneurial identification is negatively associated with role conflict. We also investigate the performance implications of such a role conflict and show that it is negatively related to academic entrepreneurship performance. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

     

The discourse of entrepreneurial masculinities (and femininities)

The overarching concern of this paper is the dominant discourse of entrepreneurship portrayed as a form of masculinity. It argues that this discourse is perpetuated by academic research and by media representations of the entrepreneur. The entrepreneur is represented in the media by a narrow range of male stereotypes, whilst women are under-represented and often that representation is linked to domestic concerns. At the same time, academic studies persistently rely on male experience to theorize entrepreneurship, and women are studied in terms of their difference. This enduring discourse results in entrepreneurial femininities being rendered invisible. This paper argues that studies in entrepreneurship should remain alert to the denial and masking of gender. It calls for entrepreneurship researchers to engage with contemporary debates in gender, culture and media studies and proposes a research agenda to challenge the dominant discourses.     

Policies to support ethnic minority enterprise: the English experience

Using Global Entrepreneurship Monitor data for 29 countries this study investigates the (differential) impact of several factors on female and male entrepreneurship at the country level. These factors are derived from three streams of literature, including that on entrepreneurship in general, on female labour force participation and on female entrepreneurship. The paper deals with the methodological aspects of investigating (female) entrepreneurship by distinguishing between two measures of female entrepreneurship: the number of female entrepreneurs and the share of women in the total number of entrepreneurs. The first measure is used to investigate whether variables have an impact on entrepreneurship in general (influencing both the number of female and male entrepreneurs). The second measure is used to investigate whether factors have a differential relative impact on female and male entrepreneurship, i.e. whether they influence the diversity or gender composition of entrepreneurship. Findings indicate that – by and large – female and male entrepreneurial activity rates are influenced by the same factors and in the same direction. However, for some factors (e.g. unemployment, life satisfaction) we find a differential impact on female and male entrepreneurship. The present study also shows that the factors influencing the number of female entrepreneurs may be different from those influencing the share of female entrepreneurs. In this light it is important that governments are aware of what they want to accomplish (i.e. do they want to stimulate the number of female entrepreneurs or the gender composition of entrepreneurship) to be able to select appropriate policy measures.     

Book Review

The article deals with Swedish well-educated female entrepreneurs (Swefees), that is entrepreneurs with a education exceeding 12 years. The Swefees seem to differ in some interesting ways both from other female entrepreneurs, from male entrepreneurs and from other women on the labour market. But it also turns out that they are of two kinds, Loner-Swefees and Family-Swefees. The Loner-Swefees are single, living in a big city environment and have an interrupted career in the public or private sector behind them. They are extremely career-oriented. The Family-Swefees are also career-oriented but try to run a family and a firm at the same time. Swefees go into business with strong feelings both of a push and pull kind. They are very professional in their way of running the firm.

The population of Swefees were found through a big questionnaire sent to a sample of 1,440 of the population of over 64,000 Swedish female entrepreneurs. A little more than 1,000 (of the 1,440) were still in business when receiving the questionnaire which around 70% of them answered. Swefees turned out to be only 6% of female entrepreneurs.     

Female entrepreneurial leadership factors

This article presents the foundations, current structure and trend of academic research into leadership factors in female entrepreneurship to provide scholars in the field with an overview of the followed research directions and to explore whether the same traditional patterns are reproduced in gender studies on entrepreneurship and leadership. For this purpose, a bibliometric analysis of the Web of Science database from 2000 to 2020 was used. With a performance analysis of variables (e.g. authors, publications, journals and countries), and thanks to scientific mapping, the links among these variables were studied. The results show that the trend of publications increased from 2015, but with little influence and output. The most influential and productive countries are the USA and Spain. 35% of the journals are based in the USA and 25% in England. The most influential ones deal with entrepreneurship, business, management and leadership. Although the foundational base is influenced by the author Ahl, known for calling for new research directions related to women entrepreneurs from a social construction perspective, the most influential articles continue to investigate gender with a dominant male bias. The network analysis reveals cooperation between different countries and authors with the USA dominating. The ambiguity of entrepreneurial leadership field due to the overlap of entrepreneurship and leadership disciplines reveals through the co-citation of journals different specialisation areas: business and entrepreneurship, management and psychology, organisational behaviour. This work provides researchers with an overview that encourages them to overcome the dominant male normative lens from new epistemological perspectives.

     

When an initiative promises more than it delivers: a multi-actor perspective of rural entrepreneurship difficulties and failure in Thailand

National governments invest in initiatives aimed at encouraging rural entrepreneurship on the assumption that it contributes to competitiveness and employment. Empirical findings about one such initiative in Thailand reveal the nature of entrepreneurship difficulties and the diverse expressions of entrepreneurship failure, not only in the sense of termination of activities and exit but also entrepreneurs’ inability to meet the objectives and aims of the initiative. Significant attitudinal inadequacies such as risk aversion, passivity and over-reliance on the public sector complement entrepreneurship resource weaknesses in explaining rural entrepreneurship difficulties and failure. Findings demonstrate inadequacies of one-size-fits-all policies seeking to encourage rural entrepreneurship by failing to address the needs and capabilities of the involved entrepreneurs. The discussion also extends current research, first, by studying rural entrepreneurship within an institutional framework in an emerging market context; second, by conceptualizing rural entrepreneurship failure and attitudinal drivers of such failure; third, by documenting and analysing the nature, sources and consequences of the distinct constructs of ‘rural entrepreneurship difficulties’ and ‘rural entrepreneurship failure’; and finally, by presenting a revised theorization of ‘failure’ in entrepreneurship research which recognizes the diverse forms that failure may assume.     

Public policy recommendations for promoting female entrepreneurship in Europe

From 2021 onwards, female entrepreneurship is expected to grow very substantially as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. The introduction of teleworking and staggered hours in many countries at national or workplace level will make possible the conciliation between labour and family life. The purpose of this paper is to identify the most influential explanatory factors in the behaviour of female entrepreneurship in Europe so as to subsequently propose efficient economic policy measures to promote it. The distinction between opportunity and necessity female entrepreneurs have been considered since both motivation and factors are different in each case. 15 econometric models using the panel data method for a sample of 20 previously selected European countries (grouped by their GDP level) during the period 2001 to 2018 have been estimated to determine which explanatory factors affect female entrepreneurship and necessity-based female entrepreneurship. The empirical analysis used demonstrates that more women enter into entrepreneurship due to necessity rather than in pursuit of opportunity for European countries both with higher levels of GDP and for countries with lower levels of GDP. In this context, the following policy measures should be implemented to promote female entrepreneurship in Europe: the optimization of government spending (training courses and mentoring, public procurement, stronger networks, support in reconciling business and family life, etc.), the government incentives for subsidizing high interest rates to support women in accessing financing, and the improvement of entrepreneurship education to increase the confidence of women in themselves in their own entrepreneurial capabilities.

     

Entrepreneurship and birth order: fact or folklore

Prior research into the birth order of entrepreneurs has supported the commonly held belief that entrepreneurs tend to be first–born children. Traditional birth–order theory and our research question this belief and its supporting research for three fundamental reasons. First, conceptually, birth order does not facilitate the prediction of entrepreneurial tendencies nor does it enable us to influence an individual in the direction of entrepreneurial pursuits, two basic goals of social science theory and research. Second, conclusions from research on entrepreneurs and birth order are inconsistent with and do not support the predictions of traditional birth–order theory. Finally, birth–order research in the area of entrepreneurship has been plagued by poor methodological control of intervening variables such as family size, socio–economic level, and education levels. An empirical test using the necessary methodological controls was conducted. As hypothesized, no relationship was found between entrepreneurship and birth order.     

Women Entrepreneurs: Can We Remove the Barriers?

Entrepreneurial activity among women continues to attract attention world wide. However, despite obvious gains, women lag behind men in business ownership and economic independence on every continent. This paper will review the research on entrepreneurship as a career choice for women, the motivations and career paths followed by women entrepreneurs, the attitudes and behaviors associated with successful ventures, the problems that persist and policies that conspire to keep women’s businesses few and small. A discussion of legislation and practices that have helped and hindered women’s entrepreneurship will follow, with suggestions for reframing the issues and reforming policies.     

“Think entrepreneur - think male”: a task and relationship scale to measure gender stereotypes in entrepreneurship

Building on the think manager – think male paradigm, this study tested the psychometric properties of an “Entrepreneurial Task and Relationship” (ETR) scale to assess gender stereotypes in entrepreneurship. The sample was composed of 1056 non-entrepreneurs and 178 entrepreneurs. Non-entrepreneurs rated the characteristics of: 1) a successful entrepreneur (n = 348); 2) a successful female entrepreneur (n = 360); and 3) a successful male entrepreneur (n = 348). Entrepreneurs rated to what extent they ascribe themselves entrepreneurial characteristics. Results revealed psychometric adequacy of a two-dimensional 13-item ETR scale to be invariant across different study conditions, non-entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs, as well as male and female participants. As with management, entrepreneurship is perceived as strongly associated with task orientation. The think entrepreneur – think male paradigm applies to entrepreneurship, highlighting the need for more awareness of gender stereotypes in that context. Implications of our study can be derived on entrepreneurship education and towards policy makers and media to promote a non-stereotyped image of entrepreneurship and foster this career option, particularly among women.

     

Family embeddedness and entrepreneurship experience: a study of Indian migrant women entrepreneurs in Australia

India has emerged as a major source of migrants for developed countries including Australia; yet, there is a dearth of research on Indian migrant entrepreneurs, particularly women. Using qualitative methods of enquiry, we explore the perceptions of Indian migrant women entrepreneurs (MWEs) and their partners in Melbourne, Australia, about their entrepreneurship experiences from a family embeddedness perspective. More specifically, we explore how family embeddedness of Indian MWEs is influenced by certain factors which in turn influence their entrepreneurship experience. Our findings suggest that entrepreneurship among Indian MWEs is a complex phenomenon influenced by their being an Indian, a woman and a new Australian, all of which interact and influence their family dynamics and entrepreneurial experience. Our findings shed light on the duality of Indian culture which exerts both an enabling and a constraining influence on the family dynamics of MWEs, the constraining role of gender and the positive impact of their integration into the host country’s sociocultural context which all influence their family embeddedness and entrepreneurship. Contributing to the discussion on ‘ethnic’ and ‘women entrepreneurship’ from a family embeddedness perspective, we offer policy implications for facilitating entrepreneurship in the growing but under-researched cohort of Indian MWEs.