Looking Back To Venture Forward: Exploring Idea and Identity Work in Public Failure Narratives

Business failure often leads entrepreneurs to craft public narratives. Taking a performative storytelling perspective of such narratives, we investigate how entrepreneurs jointly reevaluate their ideas and identities, and how this relates to their subsequent career paths. We theorize that the stories entrepreneurs tell shape who they become, changing not only how others see them but also how they see themselves. This broadens theoretical understanding of how failed entrepreneurs navigate their transition to a diverse array of subsequent careers, including different forms of serial entrepreneurship (same industry; new industry) and exit (startup employee; established business employee; exit with reentry).

The Influence of Human Capital on Re-entry Intention of Indian Micro and Small Enterprise Owners: An Empirical Investigation

Entrepreneurial exit is an important phase of the entrepreneurial process that has a significant impact on enterprises and the economy. Extant research in developed countries has shown that personal and business motives of entrepreneurs trigger exit intentions, which, in turn, affect their choice of exit strategy. Though all-India census indicates that most of the closed enterprises are micro and small enterprises (MSE), the factors influencing the exit decision of the Indian MSE owners still remain largely unexplored due to their unorganised nature. Since the majority of Indian MSEs are owned by individuals, and human capital represents the assets of each individual, this article aims to understand the influence of entrepreneurs’ human capital on exit intention for re-entry using the theory of planned behaviour. This study employs a questionnaire-based survey approach and uses a sample size of 150 MSE owners of working enterprises in industrial estates of Mangalore and Udupi districts for hypotheses testing. Empirical analysis is performed using SPSS software, and the results indicate that entrepreneurs with good health and inherited experience have exit intentions and subsequent entrepreneurial re-entry. This knowledge may be useful for stakeholders to understand serial entrepreneurship with a proper exit mechanism.

Entrepreneurial reentry after failure: a review and future research agenda

PurposeThis paper aims to review the academic literature on entrepreneurial reentry after failure in an attempt to highlight the contribution to the knowledge, identify research gaps and outline an agenda for future research.Design/methodology/approachSeveral databases such as ABI/Inform Global, Academic Search Complete, Business Source Premier and Emerald Full Text were used to find peer-reviewed journal articles. Different search terms were used, such as entrepreneurial reentry, failure of habitual entrepreneurs, reentry intentions, entrepreneurial failure, serial entrepreneurship and venture failure. A total of 27 articles were finally selected and included in the final analysis. Using thematic codes, the selected articles were manually coded.FindingsThe concept of entrepreneurial reentry after failure has recently gained some attention from entrepreneurship scholars, but still, there are significant gaps in the literature. A wide range of entrepreneurship theories can potentially provide the necessary impetus to guide future research. The current literature remains largely inconclusive with inconsistent findings. This underlines the need to focus on this domain to conduct more studies to develop knowledge. The available literature is largely focused on exploring antecedents of entrepreneurial reentry after failure. Therefore, the author’s understanding remains limited with regard to other aspects of entrepreneurial reentry after failure, such as context of reentry and outcomes of reentry. Moreover, future studies also need to include the developing country context for better understanding of entrepreneurial reentry after failure.Originality/valueTo the best of the author's knowledge, the current paper is the first identifiable review of the literature on entrepreneurial reentry after failure. The suggested areas of future research will potentially help in addressing the identified research gaps and further strengthening the theoretical foundations of this emerging research domain. Identified themes in the literature will also potentially help aspiring entrepreneurs to better understand the antecedents, contextual settings and outcomes of reentry after failure. This practical perspective will help failed entrepreneurs in particular to be more aware of the dynamics of reentry after failure and better manage the reentry process.

How Failure Leads to Learning among Nascent Entrepreneurs? The Evidence of Entrepreneurial Failure and Its Relationship to Entrepreneurial Learning

This paper investigates and examines the relationship between entrepreneurial failure and entrepreneurial learning that can be absorbed by nascent entrepreneurs. It also reveals the possible forms of learning that happen to nascent entrepreneurs as an outcome of failure. A quantitative study with relational approach with 180 failed nascent entrepreneurs in Padang, Indonesia was undertaken as the research method and study context. Data and information were collected by using a questionnaire (offline and online) as the research instrument. Statistical protocol in terms of validity and reliability tests as well as hypothesis testing, using SPSS 23 as the statistical tool were operated to analyze the data. The study found that entrepreneurial failure has significantly influenced [a] entrepreneurial learning of nascent entrepreneurs in the context of the study, [b] the ability to detect errors in business, as well as [c] error correction by nascent entrepreneurs. The study also reveals the fact that the serial entrepreneurship process occurs for nascent entrepreneurs in the context of study. Keywords: entrepreneurial failure, entrepreneurial learning, nascent entrepreneurs, error detection, error correction

Make Use of the Difference of Failure and Exit to Improve the Operation Efficiency

As business failure is a high probability event that influences the operation efficiency of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, it is necessary to know how to manage business failure experience to promote serial entrepreneurship and improve circulation in the ecosystem. While most scholars agree that it is different between failure and exit, DeTienne suggests that exit could be a way to avoid failure and protect the passion and financial condition of entrepreneurs. Therefore, this chapter analyzes the difference of failure and exit and conducts a model to help entrepreneurs decide whether to exit and how to choose a better way to exit entrepreneurship. In the meantime, this chapter analyzes why entrepreneurial exit can improve the operation efficiency of entrepreneurial ecosystem, and also it would give some ideas about how to bound from failure and benefit from failure to do better next time. After reading this chapter, entrepreneurs have the idea that failure is controllable and exit may be a restart to do business more successfully.