Regulation and entrepreneurship : an antagonism to demystify ?

This dissertation consists of five essays. The first essay offers a critical deconstruction of the literature devoted to the impact of regulation on entrepreneurship. Our deconstruction highlights the predominance of an economic approach focused on the assessment of the “constraining” dimensions of regulations, as well as the emergence of a challenging approach that looks at the way entrepreneurs adapt their behaviors to new regulations. Using this second approach, we next try to understand why some entrepreneurs positively use regulation as a source of business opportunity and how do they succeed in this. The purpose of the second essay of this dissertation is to conceptually answer that question by developing research propositions, while both the third and fourth essays aim at answering it empirically. In the third essay, we make a multiple cases study of entrepreneurs investigating the positive use of different regulations, while the fourth essay is based upon interviews with 14 nascent entrepreneurs about one specific regulation, i.e. the Support Structures for Self-employment Creation Act. The fifth essay examines how regulations should be constructed to facilitate entrepreneurship. It is a normative essay designed to provide Belgian lawmakers with useful recommendations.(IAG 3) -- UCL, 201

Incubateurs et statuts spécifiquement dédiés aux étudiants entrepreneurs : Des outils de destruction entrepreneuriale ?

Cette communication poursuit l’objectif de présenter une recherche en cours menée par des enseignants-chercheurs sur un dispositif d’accompagnement des étudiants entrepreneurs dans lequel ces enseignants sont eux-mêmes parties prenantes. La posture adoptée n’est pas celle du chercheur-observateur en surplomb, mais s’inscrit plutôt dans une démarche d’auto questionnement et de réflexivité

Place du doute dans le processus entrepreneurial : Exploration empirique de trois temps-clés

La réalité questionne nos approches et nos certitudes. Ainsi, lorsque l’on rencontre ou coache des entrepreneurs, le mythe de l’entrepreneur super-héros s’efface au rythme des nombreuses phases de doute qui traversent le parcours de ces entrepreneurs. Notre communication interroge cette réalité sur le plan théorique en recensant ce que dit la littérature en entrepreneuriat sur le doute entrepreneurial, tout en la faisant dialoguer avec la littérature en management et la littérature en psychologie. Nous proposons ensuite un cadre à penser le doute entrepreneurial qui s’appuie sur ces éléments théoriques et les prolonge grâce à une étude qualitative exploratoire menée auprès de 15 entrepreneurs. Le cadre proposé balise les questions de définition du doute entrepreneurial, de place de ce phénomène au sein du processus entrepreneurial, et d’enjeux liés à ce phénomène notamment en termes d’accompagnement de l’entrepreneur

The right word for the right crowd: an attempt to recognize the influence of emotions

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose a better understanding of how entrepreneurial narrative influences resource acquisition in the fundraising context. Design/methodology/approach – The paper combines the literature on emotion as information theory from psychology with behavioral finance findings to develop a conceptual framework with research proposals highlighting the use of narratives in the crowdfunding process. Findings – The proposition of the paper advocates that entrepreneurial narrative may influence crowdfunders’ attitude and decision to fund a project. It theorizes how emotions in narratives shape the funders’ attitude toward a project and, in turn, their decision to support it. This potential influence is qualified by taking into account the funders’ primary motivations. These motivations affect the degree to which funders rely on affect or cognition to form their attitude and to which they are influenced by more emotional or cognitive narratives. Originality/value – This framework is the result of an effort to achieve the recognition of emotions in entrepreneurial funding. The paper creates a bridge between the narrative emotional content and the often neglected emotional arousal of funders (considered as traditional investors) to provide a framework for explaining crowdfunders’ decision making. The paper also offers nuances by taking into account the different audiences’ motivations to fund a project

About how to be good with (crowd)words. The entrepreneur’s narrative on crowdfunders’ intention to support a project.

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Tell me on which crowdfunding platform you are and I tell you which crowd is yours. The influence of entrepreneurial narratives on the crowd’s evaluative and behavioral response.

We develop a framework connecting the ability of an entrepreneur to construct a narrative and his/her ability to raise funds. To do so, we extend the findings of Martens, Jennings and Jennings (2007) that point out the strategic use of narratives to influence investors’ decision making in IPO. We use their research as a starting point to develop a conceptual framework which is potentially better suited to crowdfunding, as an emerging financing alternative. This framework is the result of an effort to achieve the recognition of funders’ emotions in their decision making. Inspired by behavioral finance, we advance novel arguments about the strategic use of narratives in the crowdfunding process. Specifically, we theorize how the use of emotions in narratives shapes funders’ emotional attitude toward the firm and in turn, their decision to participate in it

Crowdfunding et solidarité

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How to Be Good with (Crowd)words: The Influence of Entrepreneurs’ Narratives on Crowdfunders’ Intentions to Support Projects

Despite the increasing popularity of crowdfunding, we still need to better understand the effect of entrepreneurs’ narratives on their campaign’s success. Drawing on “emotions as social information” theory, this paper explores the effect of emotions expressed via narratives on funders’ intentions to support a crowdfunding project. We conducted an experiment with 251 participants who had to assess their intention to support a project presented to them. The results show that emotions expressed via narratives are positively related with the emotional reaction of crowdfunders which in turn affects their intention to support a project. The results further show that the main processing style of crowdfunders (emotional versus cognitive) also has an impact on their emotional reaction, which is reinforced by the expression of emotions in the narratives

The influence of emotions, authenticity and sense of community on entrepreneur’s ability to acquire funds via crowdfunding

This paper develops and tests a set of hypotheses concerning how the tone of entrepreneurial narratives affects funding success. We first test our propositions on a sample of projects seeking resources on a donation and reward-based crowdfunding platform (Ulule). Our results suggest that money providers on such a platform prefer narratives characterized by a relatively high emotional language. Results also indicate that the community feeling displayed has a particularly high influence. Its influence dominates the influence of the emotional tone while both aspects are present in the entrepreneurial narrative. We further take an interest in the influence of the same variables on a lending- and equity-based platforms (MyMicroInvest). Our results indicate the cognitive tone (rather than the emotional one) predicts funding success. However, the creation of a sense community stays an indicator of success. Collectively, our results are coherent with our hypotheses that backers on donation and reward-based platforms are motivated by the emotional dimension while funders on lending- and equity-based platform are guided by cognitive considerations to a greater extent. We contribute to the entrepreneurial resource acquisition literature by recognizing the emotional dimension of money providers’ decision making, by considering the crowdfunder as a resources’ provider to be distinguished from the traditional investor and by showing how it may affect an entrepreneur's ability in resources acquisition