The attitudes, behaviors and cognition of entrepreneurs: rebels with a cause

1.1 Introduction

We begin with the above two quotations from popular media because they highlight an essential aspect of entrepreneurship: by its very nature, entrepreneurship involves efforts to do something new in the face of challenges. Individuals, whether alone, in teams, or in established companies strive to introduce products, services or business models to the market that are novel in comparison to existing offerings (Shane and Venkataraman, 2000). But in their efforts to differentiate their offerings entrepreneurs often must rebel against the status quo. High profile entrepreneurs, such as Elon Musk, are known for going against the grain by doing things like becoming the first non-government entity to launch rockets into space. While the challenging nature of doing something new is inherent in entrepreneurship, it is often much more than simply pushing back against current norms and practices. Instead, these actors are rebels with a cause. Specifically, as entrepreneurs generate ideas and strive to make their visions realities, the goal is to achieve a more advantageous equilibrium for others in a way that benefits them as well. As the above quotations highlight, some of the most useful advances in the arts, politics, medicine, science, technology and so on are the result of entrepreneurs being unwilling to accept the status quo as “the best we can do.”

But what is it about how these enterprising individuals think and act that allows them to “rebel” in ways that are productive and result in new introduction that others value? Prior research indicates that entrepreneurs bring unique cognitive resources formed from their education, experience and relationships to specific circumstances and this allows them to envision new innovations (Cornelissen and Clarke, 2010; Gregoire et al., 2010). Importantly, these visions are cognitively evaluated for desirability and feasibility (Mitchell and Shepherd, 2010; Wood and Williams, 2014) and when positive, such evaluations are translated into actions designed to marshal resources in pursuit of “what could be” (Dolmans et al., 2014). All of this occurs under conditions of high uncertainty because whether or not such thinking and action will prove wise or foolish is unknown ex ante (McMullen and Shepherd, 2006; McKelvie et al., 2011).

As these discussions highlight, our understanding of how individuals think and act entrepreneurially has matured considerably in recent years. For example, scholars have demonstrated that factors such as cognitive style (Adomako et al., 2016), values (Kirkley, 2016) and team interactions (Chen et al., 2017) significantly influence entrepreneurial efforts. In spite of this, extant entrepreneurship research on the cognitions, attitudes and behaviors of entrepreneurs can be characterized as holding significant untapped potential to provide transformative insights regarding these important economic actors. In response, we are pleased to introduce this special issue of International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour & Research (IJEBR) and the specific articles contained herein, in an effort to better understand the constructs, relationships and dynamics that underpin the introduction of pioneering products and path-breaking processes that collectively alter the status quo over time. This issue was developed in conjunction with the 2017 United States Association of Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) annual conference in Philadelphia, PA (hence the theme of “rebels” as Philadelphia’s history is rich with rebels and rebellion dating back to the US fight for independence); we began the process by asking for papers around a theme of “Rebels with a cause: the revolutionary attitudes, behaviors, and cognition of entrepreneurs.”

To facilitate the process, we invited scholars to submit papers that addressed not only the distinctive characteristics of entrepreneurial attitudes, behaviors and cognition, but how, when and why these distinctions lead to pervasive change. In addition, we also encouraged scholars to submit papers that acknowledged the interplay between mind, environment and action (Wood et al., 2014; Mitchell et al., 2011; Shelton, 2010) and to do so across multiple units of analysis such as the individual, team, organization and so on. A unique feature of this special issue was the developmental nature of the review process whereby authors received significant guidance as part of an IJEBR workshop at the 2017 USASBE conference.

It is with this in mind, that we introduce the sum of our efforts. Together, the five manuscripts selected for this special issue represent the collective work of 12 scholars from nine institutions. These contributions provide a variety of perspectives across different units of analysis, and the net effect is a set of articles that address two broad themes: revolutionary thinking and transformative action. In retrospect, we find it interesting that the focus of the special issue on rebels with a cause is more on the cause than on the rebel. Although we would not have predicted this initially, we are excited about papers that begin to understand underlying mechanisms that enable revolutionary and transformative outcomes in the lives of entrepreneurs. In this sense, the papers that are published in this special issue make contributions to prior research, but also serve as a helpful platform for future research.

In this introductory piece, we begin by highlighting some key linkages to prior research. We then briefly discuss the specific contributions of each of the papers in the special issue. Finally, we highlight future research opportunities that exist in the investigation of the revolutionary cognitions and behavior of entrepreneurs, many of whom we like to think of as rebels with a cause. As just noted, the “with a cause” aspect of the framing of the special issue involves a focus on extending what we know about how entrepreneurs are revolutionary in their thinking and transformative in their actions. To this we now turn.

3.1 Revolutionary thinking

When it comes to revolutionary thinking immigrants can be some of the most innovative actors in the economy. As such, immigrant entrepreneurship has emerged as an important topic of research. Zhang and Chun add to the conversation by investigating the formation of entrepreneurial identity among immigrants. Their approach uniquely draws on in-depth qualitative interviews with Chinese immigrants in Canada who left behind careers as skilled workers, and the prestige associated with their positions, to immigrate to another country and become self-employed. The qualitative interviews provide rich data that revealed immigrants transition to entrepreneurial identities through three processes: exploring possible selves, building entrepreneurial mindsets and developing narratives.

In uncovering these processes, Zhang and Chun document in some detail, that the process of identity transformation is often long and fraught with insecurity and self-doubt. They go on to provide evidence that enterprising immigrants overcome this via a predictable set of dynamics such as developing narratives about a new identity as an entrepreneur. Based on these insights, the authors synthesize identity theory and entrepreneurship research in a way that provides unique insights into how immigrant entrepreneurs reinvent themselves as they transition to self-employment. This opens new opportunities for research at the intersection of identity and entrepreneurship as it relates to ways in which individuals conceptualize themselves as actors capable of enabling change.

Adding to this, Cruz, Fluminense, Falcao and Barreto study communities of Brazilian immigrant entrepreneurs in Florida. These authors use a capital theory approach through the perspectives of Bourdieu’s economic, human and social capital to identify different types of entrepreneurship by Brazilians residing in Florida communities. The authors bring to the fore issues concerning why, how and when Brazilian citizens pursue new business ventures. To achieve this, the researchers utilized a comparative case study approach, that included in-depth interviews with 80 entrepreneurs where they triangulated the data using secondary sources and surveys. This empirical approach enabled the construction of detail profiles of individual Brazilian entrepreneurs, settled in two locations of Florida: Pompano Beach (Miami area) and Orlando. By comparing these two entrepreneurial communities of the same ethnicity, the study taps into dynamics often overlooked in traditional single community studies.

Specifically, the picture that emerged as a result of these efforts is that immigrant entrepreneurs’ capital provisions and social identities hold sway over their market choices. The findings also reveal the different motivations of Brazilian entrepreneurs within these communities for engaging in revolutionary thinking manifest as new venture creation. Notably, the majority of the interviewees were deemed to be “opportunity driven” such that the motivation for starting a business came from the recognition of alluring business opportunities as opposed to a lack of options for traditional employment options. Together, these findings add insights on immigrant and ethnic entrepreneurship (see e.g. Sanders and Nee, 1996) and, thus, serves as a building block for future comparative studies on immigrant communities.

Stambaugh and Mitchell shift the focus to entrepreneurship as a journey (McMullen and Dimov, 2013; Sserwanga and Rooks, 2014) where individuals create expertise in the fight to avoid failure. In this paper, aptly titled “The Fight is the Coach” the researchers take a truly novel approach to investigate failure and learning in entrepreneurial ventures. Learning can be costly and in this study the authors examine learning that occurs before an entrepreneurial failure event, and factors that could affect the level of learning during the failure event itself. Their conceptual work draws on the literatures of entrepreneurial learning through failure, entrepreneurial cognition and deliberate-practice expertise development to suggest that the struggles the entrepreneur encounters can be viewed as a form of coaching.

Their theory complements entrepreneurship research at the nexus of learning (Corbett, 2005, 2007) and failure (Shepherd, 2013) by taking a broader consideration of the process and context of failure. This is important because learning and failure are typically treated as distinct phenomena and Stambaugh and Mitchell highlight the value of synthesizing these two dynamics by introducing the notion that significant learning is possible before and during the actual failure event. By segmenting entrepreneurial failure in this manner, this paper’s explanation incorporates differences in individual responses during the process of failing that could affect levels of learning. The paper applies the concept of deliberate practice in a “quasi-practice” setting: that is, within a real-life setting in which the “fight” to avoid entrepreneurial failure serves as the “coach” for learning. This approach paves the way for future empirical research that provides an improved understanding of learning as function of engaging in the revolutionary thinking that underpins transformative action.

3.2 Transformative action

While revolutionary thinking is central to disrupting the status quo through entrepreneurship, to fully understand entrepreneurship-based change requires an understanding the mechanisms of the transformative actions of entrepreneurs. There are two papers in the special issue that speak to this. The first is an informative study by Meek and Williams who explore the reasons why entrepreneurs choose to exit from their firm or persist. In other words, they explore why some abandon transformative action while others carry on in the face of adversity. Their approach moves beyond financial performance as a predictor of exit (Wennberg et al., 2010) and hence brings forward a number of nuanced insights. Using a unique multi-year case study, Meek and Williams draw on participant observation, autobiographical and interview data to provide insights into how nascent entrepreneurs persist despite outward appearances suggesting limited progress. The case study data revealed new insights that coalesce into a theoretical model on entrepreneurial persistence through stage gates and opportunity variation. In essence, these authors demonstrate that persistence involves overcoming stage-gate barriers, and that entrepreneurs use their full and part-time job experiences to overcome the impediments blocking their fledgling entrepreneurial endeavors. In some cases, this involves taking incremental steps forward as motivation for nascent entrepreneurs to persist even though there has been little outward evidence of progress. These findings extend theories of persistence, entrepreneurial action and career anchors by suggesting that nascent entrepreneurs who are slowly making progress toward start-up may be seeking (consciously or not) congruence between different possible future venture configurations and their preferred work environment. Ultimately, their model of entrepreneurial persistence adds clarity to how entrepreneurs navigate the perils of engaging in transformative action.

In a second paper tied to transformative action, Noack, Miller and Guidice capitalize on the realization that while the management literature has long-studied organizational commitment, little is known about such commitment within a new venture context. This lead to questions about the co-founders and their commitment to joining a new venture vs pursuing a more traditional and stable career path. To address this, these authors utilize equity ownership distribution decision of the founding team to examine how current employment situations and alternative job prospects impact the relationship between co-founder perceptions of distributive justice and organizational commitment. They do so by surveying 117 co-founders via Amazon M-Turk, a relative new approach that is gaining traction in the literature.

Findings from this empirical effort confirm organizational commitment literature in the new venture context by documenting a positive relationship between perceptions of distributive justice and organizational commitment. However, when co-founders report having a second (or primary) job, in addition to the new venture (often called hybrid entrepreneurship, Raffiee and Feng, 2014), the relationship is mitigated. Yet, higher levels of alternative employment options appear to strengthen the primary relationship between justice and commitment. Noack and collages conclude, then, that perceptions of fairness and justice appear to provide valuable implications for founders, seeking to bring on co-founders, concerned about organizational commitment and employee buy-in. The implication is that founders should take caution when engaged in transformative action that requires bringing on co-founders who have another job. This is because these hybrid entrepreneurs’ levels of commitment will likely be impacted in ways that may negatively affect the new venture.