Implementation intentions in the entrepreneurial process: concept, empirical findings, and research agenda

Prior studies find sizable gaps between entrepreneurial intentions and subsequent actions. We extend models of entrepreneurial intentions by drawing on action phase theory to better understand how entrepreneurial intentions translate into actions. Our study focuses on the effects of implementation intentions on taking entrepreneurial action. The analysis uses two waves of survey data on 422 individuals, from the Swedish general population, who had an explicit interest in starting a business and who reported on their actions 6 months later. We test and find support for a moderated mediation model in which implementation intentions mediate the effects of goal intentions on taking entrepreneurial action. We further find the mediated effect to be even stronger for those confirming a strong intention to start a new business. We provide an in-depth discussion of the concept of implementation intention and an extensive research agenda.Peer reviewe

The emotional embeddedness of corporate entrepreneurship : the case of envy

This paper argues for the emotional embeddedness of the entrepreneurial act as a moderator of its social embeddedness. Building on the theoretical grounds of the sociology of emotions, we propose the study of entrepreneurial affect as an element of the social-emotional interaction between the entrepreneur and others influenced by the entrepreneurial process. The empirical context of corporate entrepreneurship is used to illustrate how the emotion cycle around the entrepreneurial act, involving the emotions of corporate entrepreneurs and others, indicates the emotional embeddedness of the latter. The emergence of envy towards members of two venturing programs is used to exemplify low levels of emotional and consequently social embeddedness

The corporate venturing process of large corporations : a critical realist perspective

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Forging a collective entrepreneurial identity within existing organizations through corporate venturing

Publisher Copyright: © 2021, Emerald Publishing Limited.Purpose: This study unpacks how organizational members construct a collective entrepreneurial identity within an organization and attempt to instill entrepreneurial features in the organization's existing identity. Design/methodology/approach: The study draws on the cases of two venturing units, perceived as entrepreneurial groups within their respective parent companies. Semi-structured interviews and secondary data were collected and analyzed inductively and abductively. Findings: The data revealed that organizational members co-constructed a “corporate entrepreneur” role identity to form a collective shared belief and communities of practice around what it meant to act as an entrepreneurial group within their local corporate context and how it differentiated them from others. Members also clustered around the emergent collective entrepreneurial identity through sensegiving efforts to instill entrepreneurial features in the organization's identity, despite the tensions this caused. Originality/value: Previous studies in corporate entrepreneurship have theorized on the top-down dynamics instilling entrepreneurial features in an organization's identity, but have neglected the role of bottom-up dynamics. This study reveals two bottom-up dynamics that involve organizational members' agentic role in co-constructing and clustering around a collective entrepreneurial identity. This study contributes to the middle-management literature, uncovering champions' identity work in constructing a “corporate entrepreneur” role identity, with implications for followers' engagement in constructing a collective entrepreneurial identity. This study also contributes to the organizational identity literature, showing how tensions around the entrepreneurial group's distinctiveness may hinder the process of instilling entrepreneurial features in an organization's identity.Peer reviewe

Resisting change: organizational decoupling through an identity construction perspective

The purpose of this paper is to provide a framework that explains how individual organizational members’ self-construction processes motivate them to support or reject decoupling as a form of resistance to institutionally mandated change. Most studies have looked at powerful organizational actors and top management teams that decide to decouple. This paper broadens our understanding through a micro-level approach that focuses on the role of individual members within organizational. Specifically, it looks at what happens inside organizations after the decision to decouple has been taken. This paper identifies three alternative self identity construction pathways that members may choose following the decision of an organization to decouple: a) strong identification with the organization; b) strong identification with the institutional pressure; and c) adoption of both organizational and institutional identities. Our framework specifies how and under which conditions the way individuals identify and manage identity multiplicity impacts organizational resistance to change. Future research could test the proposed framework particularly through case studies or qualitative designs that look deep into organizational processes and individual attitudes towards decoupling. Practitioners, particularly top management teams, can adopt a moderating role in influencing the identification process of their employees. They can also communicate better why efficiency is more important than the mandated changes, and why decoupling must be supported to safeguard the organization’s “efficient” identity. Our paper integrates institutional theory’s macro-perspectives with micro-perspectives of individual members’ identity and self-construction processes within organizations. It contributes to existing institutional accounts of agentic change and resistance to change through a dynamic framework that prescribes individual interests and preferences based on identification processes

Family Structure and Ownership Transition as “Polar Opposites”: An Emotional Embeddedness Perspective

Family firms provide a fertile ground to study emotions as a source of contradiction. The interplay of a firm and an owner family exerts influence on strategic decisions in a way that differs from decision-making in non-family firms, such as ownership transition choices. I apply an emotional embeddedness perspective to explain ownership transition choices, which contradict the prevailing instrumental logic in management research. Repeated interactions between actors with different roles in a family firm shape the quality of the family's structure and its effect on important strategic outcomes. The interplay of family structure and emotional embeddedness can lead to ownership transition choices that contradict an instrumental logic of action. Although family structure might be conducive to internal ownership transition, this choice is not always the preferred option because of intervening conditions and the application of alternative principles of action. Researchers in the field of contradiction studies should probe into situations in the management context, in which circumstances may favour the application of an instrumental logic but actually lead to unexpected choices and outcomes. This would enhance our understanding of contingencies that foster alternative action principles in economic action and interaction