Perceived Causes of Small Business Failures: A Research Note

1983 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert A. Peterson ◽  
George Kozmetsky ◽  
Nancy M. Ridgway
Keyword(s):  
Small Business ◽  
Management Education ◽  
Nationwide Survey ◽  
Business Owners ◽  
Research Note ◽  
Business Failure ◽  
Small Business Owners ◽  
Business Systems ◽  
Business Failures ◽  
Small Business Failure

A nationwide survey of approximately 1,000 small business owners and managers was conducted to investigate the perceived causes of small business failure. In addition, survey participants were asked for suggestions for reducing the number of small business failures. The major cause of small business failures—according to the individuals surveyed—is a lack of management expertise. Consequently, the survey participants’ primary suggestion for decreasing small business failures was to improve management education. 1 1 This research was supported in part by a grant from Safeguard Business Systems, Inc.

Factors of Small Business Mentoring and Practices

2020 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 104-114
Author(s):  
Brajaballav Kar ◽  
Subrat Sarangi
Keyword(s):  
Small Business ◽  
Structured Interview ◽  
Business Owners ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Business Failure ◽  
Survey Method ◽  
Small Business Owners ◽  
Management Skills ◽  
Process Outcomes ◽  
Perceptions And Expectations

Mentoring is essential when we consider the socio-economic profile of small business owners and the considerable rate of business failure. Entrepreneurs are independent as well as innovative by nature, and they may not like to discuss their confidential business issues with a third party. On the other hand, a mentor has to understand, help, support and improve overall aspects of the mentee’s business. Thus, mentoring entrepreneurs seems to be inherently contradictory. The function of the mentor and the mentoring process outcomes are not precisely understood. The argument ‘Mentoring is what a mentor does’ indicates the lack of clarity. This research uses a semi-structured interview and survey method to understand the mentoring process in practice. The perceptions and expectations of mentors and small business owners are analysed. Findings indicate that mentors are more likely to underestimate the outcomes of the mentoring process compared to mentees. The appropriate experience and expertise of the mentor are considered more important in the mentoring process. There are no significant differences in the perceptions between mentors and business owners regarding mentoring contribution to marketing, finance and people management skills. Factor analysis for the 15 variables used in the scale suggests 6 factors such as capacity building, connect, chronemics, collaboration, concreteness and trust (5Cs and 1T) to be critical mentoring outcomes. The article contributes to small business owners, mentoring practitioners and funding agencies by clarifying the relationship among various factors involved in mentoring. The article also discusses the future agenda for research on small business mentoring.

scholarly journals Investigating whether a lack of marketing and managerial skills is the main cause of business failure in South Africa

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 402-411 ◽  
Author(s):  
S Radipere ◽  
L Van Scheers
Keyword(s):  
Small Business ◽  
Small Businesses ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Research Problem ◽  
Business Owners ◽  
High Rate ◽  
Business Failure ◽  
Small Business Owners ◽  
Managerial Skills ◽  
Financial Factors

The literature reveals that 40 per cent of new business ventures fail in their first year, 60 per cent in their second year, and 90 per cent in their first 10 years of existence. The research problem of this study is suggested by this high rate of business failure. This study investigates whether lack of marketing and managerial skills in business owners contributes to the high rate of business failure in South Africa.It is evident from the results that small business owners lack certain managerial skills, including financial, marketing and human-resource management skills, needed to operate their businesses successfully. The findings confirm that small business owners are in need of support services such as training, counselling, and financial assistance.  They also show that small businesses are constrained not only by financial factors but also specifically by non-financial factors such as lack of education, inadequate managerial skills, poor access to markets, lack of information and unreliable infrastructure.  The analysis also indicates that the managerial skills possessed by the respondents do not correlate with those that they preferably should have to run a successful business.The study concludes that a lack of marketing and managerial skills has a negative impact on the success, viability and development of small businesses.  The challenge is to improve the managerial skills of small business owners, since the small business sector is widely considered to be the ideal site for the solving of South Africa’s unemployment problems and the rejuvenation of its stagnating economy.

Suggestions on Tax Support for Small Business Owners

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-107
Author(s):  
Sung Ho Jang ◽  
Sung Ook Park ◽  
Hyung Jong Na
Keyword(s):  
Small Business ◽  
Business Owners ◽  
Small Business Owners

Retirement, Recessions and Older Small Business Owners

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tami Gurley-Calvez ◽  
Kandice Kapinos ◽  
Donald James Bruce
Keyword(s):  
Small Business ◽  
Business Owners ◽  
Small Business Owners

Measuring Success in Family Businesses: The Concept of Configurational Fit

2006 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 115-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christoph Hienerth ◽  
Alexander Kessler
Keyword(s):  
Small Business ◽  
Small Businesses ◽  
Business Owners ◽  
Border Region ◽  
Small Business Owners ◽  
Comparable Data ◽  
Measurement Instruments ◽  
Success Measurement ◽  
Success Evaluation ◽  
As Effects

The problems associated with measuring success in small businesses are primarily caused by a lack of comparable data due to the ambiguity of “success” and by subjective biases. Success evaluation is dominated by the estimates of business owners, who tend to overestimate overall success and internal strengths. However, reliable success measurement instruments would be useful for small business owners/managers as well as small business policymakers. The main purposes of this article are to compare various measures of success, to explore the differences in their outcomes, and to analyze whether a model of success measurement using configurational fit can be used to overcome subjective biases. The study is based on a recent survey of 103 small family-owned businesses in the eastern Austrian border region. Our analysis of the data confirmed the existence of the measurement problems mentioned above. Although some individual indicators show significant biases as well as effects due to company age, size, and industry, the aggregated indicator based on the concept of configurational fit seems to be an appropriate means of overcoming most of these drawbacks.

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