Abstract Radical process discontinuities provide opportunities for the founding of new firms across multiple industries; however, little is known about such emergence activity. This article examines nascent technology emergence by studying patterns of related entrepreneurial activity across multiple industries based on a radical process discontinuity. Using historical and statistical methods to examine all nanotechnology firms founded before 2005, I find that during technology emergence, entrepreneurship occurs first in upstream industries. These upstream entrepreneurs provide the technological foundations that enable the founding of firms in other industries developing the technology. The results show the role of industry interaction in the development of both upstream and downstream industries. Implications for entrepreneurs and technology emergence are discussed. Copyright © 2010 Strategic Management Society.

Abstract Multidivisional firms often fail to take advantage of innovations that involve combining resources from distinct divisions. This failure of cross‐line‐of‐business innovation is a consequence of design choices employed to execute the firm's strategy: in organizing around its core businesses, the firm renders interdependence between divisions residual to the formal structure. As a result, those innovations which involve cross‐line‐of‐business interdependence are trumped by the firm's articulated strategy and structure. Social structures could, potentially, fill this coordination gap. But social structures associated with the initiation of interdependent innovation are inversely associated with their execution. We build a dynamic, corporate‐level, evolutionary model in which individuals autonomously initiate cross‐line‐of‐business projects not through the formal structure of the firm, but using contacts from their own social networks. Some of these projects are selected and actively supported by senior executives; this support sends clear signals about what collaboration is valued by the firm, which gives other actors powerful, albeit informal, incentives to connect with others across the interunit boundary. As a result, the sparse interunit social structure that was conducive to initiation changes, becoming much more cohesive (at least locally) and is able to support execution and retain these interdependent innovations. Thus, where intra‐divisional innovations are primarily driven by organizational structure, we suggest that interdivisional innovations are driven primarily by social networks. Copyright © 2007 Strategic Management Society.

Research summary Venture founders rely on the help of others in their community to move their emerging enterprises forward. While these helping behaviors, here called venture advocate behaviors (VABs), are critical for founders with limited resources, they have received little theoretical or empirical attention. We explore VABs and develop propositions regarding a venture advocate's propensity to engage in such behaviors. Using social exchange theory, we examine how reciprocity between different actors, including paying back and paying forward, and other factors promote VABs. Managerial summary Founders of new ventures need to understand the factors that encourage others to give them the help they need for their new firms to survive and grow—what we call venture advocate behaviors (VABs). A new firm that enables these VABs is able to access resources without a monetary burden because they are activated through social exchanges. In order to enable VABs, founders need to understand the individual characteristics of potential advocates, how they will assess the likelihood of success of the new venture, and the decision rules they will use, such as reciprocity, building socioemotional wealth, and the positive identification the potential advocate has within the local venture ecosystem. Copyright © 2016 Strategic Management Society.

The growing body of research on the creation view of opportunities suggests that social processes between potential entrepreneurs and interested parties often account for why many technically brilliant business ideas are abandoned sometime between conceptualization and market launch. Surprisingly though, few studies have comprehensively examined the different roles various categories of social resources play at different stages of the opportunity‐creation process. Hence, the present article fills this gap by outlining how the unique resources of social capital and social competence facilitate entrepreneurs' ability to guide imagined ideas through the multistage, path dependent, socially complex opportunity‐creation process. Copyright © 2015 Strategic Management Society.

Abstract We empirically examine the effect of self‐efficacy on entrepreneurial investment choices. We identify various attributes of entrepreneurial investment and argue that higher self‐efficacy is associated with more aggressive entrepreneurial investment decisions. We show that self‐efficacy increases the likelihood of being a nascent entrepreneur and creating an operating business. Self‐efficacy also increases the proportion of personal wealth invested in the venture and the amount of hours per week the entrepreneur devotes to the venture. These results are significant even when controlling for other known characteristics associated with entrepreneurial investment. Copyright © 2009 Strategic Management Society.

Abstract Research Summary We explore the impact of new venture team (NVT) stability on long‐run organizational growth. With an instrumental variable design, we leverage a matched employer‐employee dataset of all Danish new ventures from 1981 to 1997. We find strong evidence that NVT stability has a positive effect on organizational growth in employees and that the effect grows stronger over time. We also find that stability is especially impactful for larger teams and for teams with higher education levels. The gains from stability also appear to be driven entirely by mixed‐gender teams. We connect our findings to the literature on NVT dynamics and suggest avenues for future research. Managerial Summary Stability within founding teams is crucial for the longevity and expansion of new ventures. We examine a dataset of Danish startups and find that ventures with stable founding teams demonstrate a 16.1 percentage point higher likelihood of survival and a 20.4% increase in average size after 10 years. This effect is accentuated in larger, more educated, and gender‐diverse teams. For entrepreneurs, these insights underscore the importance of not only assembling a strong initial team but also maintaining its composition to leverage growth opportunities as the business evolves.

Research Summary We reexamine and explore the modern view of inequality against entrepreneurial market process theories, which leads us to three key assertions. First, we question the validity of income inequality as a proxy for true inequality (i.e., inequality of individual well‐being), observing nonlinearity between the two constructs. Second, we explore the entrepreneurial microfoundations of growing and shrinking inequality in market societies, arguing that individual inequality is primarily the outcome of abnormal gains from disequilibrating creative destructive processes. These shifts are temporary, however, as equilibrating (arbitraging) entrepreneurship competes away monopoly profits. Growing inequality trends, then, are seen primarily as the result of increasingly large, but also shorter, waves of creative destruction. Finally, we reconsider the issue of the injustice of inequality through this market process lens. Managerial summary We contribute three arguments to the debate over economic inequality. We are (or ought to be) concerned over differences in individual well‐being, not income. Studies of income inequality can be misleading. We argue that a key and so far overlooked source of economic inequality is entrepreneurship. Disruptive entrepreneurship (via innovation) redistributes economic resources away from the present industry, reallocating them in a more unequal redistribution, with the successful disruptor capturing an unequal share of resources. Imitative entrepreneurship, however, tends to mitigate this inequality, competing away abnormal profits while expanding new products’ diffusion among consumers. Finally, we observe that economic inequality may not be as unjust as previously thought, and we caution against corrective policy that might inhibit entrepreneurship.

Abstract Research Summary The importance of entrepreneurial framing for legitimating novelty is well established, but the distinct challenges of legitimating radical novelty have received less attention. We articulate these challenges and propose fictional framing—the strategic and imaginative construction of a narrative world that blends the real and the imaginary using the practices of fictionalizing—as a means for addressing them. Drawing on literary theory, narratology, and the psychology of fiction, we theorize how fictional framing can engage stakeholders in co‐imagining through specific imaginative impacts. We further theorize how stakeholder co‐imagining fosters possibilistic thinking, changing their evaluative logic from focusing on likelihood and fit to what could be possible. Our framework extends the entrepreneurial framing toolkit by theorizing the distinct mechanisms for legitimating radical novelty through fictional framing. Managerial Summary When entrepreneurs pursue radically novel ventures, from space habitation to de‐extinction, conventional framing strategies that emphasize fit with existing knowledge and market categories are often ineffective. We propose that entrepreneurs can instead use fictional framing—the strategic and imaginative construction of a narrative world that blends the real and imaginary using fictionalizing practices. Unlike hype, which inflates expectations, fictional framing invites stakeholders to co‐imagine possibilities and evaluate radically novel projects based on their transformative potential rather than their probability of success. Leveraging the power of fiction to transport, support mental simulation, and prompt audiences to envision themselves acting within the imagined world, we propose how entrepreneurs can turn stakeholders into co‐explorers of the imaginary—active participants in co‐imagining and co‐creating consequential futures.

Abstract In this article, we examine competitive moves by which firms achieve superior performance. In contrast to prior work that has focused on moves and the related competitive advantages of large firms, we draw attention to entrepreneurial firms. Based on 32 runs of a multi‐round experiential simulation and in‐depth participant interviews, we find that entrepreneurial firms require competitive strategies that are different from those of a control group of comparable large firms. Entrepreneurial firms that stay below the radar in established markets and are quick to explore in new markets perform better. They succeed in established markets with a strategy that works around large firm competition but ultimately surprises them, and in new markets with a strategy that sets the standards of competition swiftly by continuously creating and destroying new strongholds ahead of large firms. Overall, successful entrepreneurs use a combination of selective, invisible, and asynchronous strategies that vary depending on whether the market is established or new. Our findings contribute to literatures on evolutionary learning, exploration and exploitation, and competitive dynamics. Copyright © 2012 Strategic Management Society.

Research summary Entrepreneurs often need resources controlled by stakeholders to form and exploit opportunities. While many of these resources can be acquired through simple contracts, the acquisition of some may require efforts on the part of stakeholders that go beyond what can be specified contractually. Such efforts—extra‐role behaviors—generally involve the formation of deep psychological bonds between stakeholders and entrepreneurial endeavors. In an entrepreneurial context, the process of creating these bonds can be called stakeholder enrollment. Critical attributes of this process are shown to vary by the informational setting (risky or uncertain) within which entrepreneurship takes place. Managerial summary Entrepreneurs often need to gain access to resources controlled by other stakeholders to be successful. In some cases, entrepreneurs must induce these stakeholders to form deep psychological bonds in order to obtain the required resources. The process of creating these bonds is called stakeholder enrollment. This article notes that entrepreneurs can use information about the nature of the opportunity they are pursuing, information about themselves (i.e., the entrepreneurs' charisma, trustworthiness, and reputation), or both, to enroll stakeholders. This article suggests that the more uncertain a particular opportunity is, the less entrepreneurs can use information about the opportunity and the more they must rely on information about themselves to successfully enroll stakeholders.