Getting Up After Falling Down: A Tale of Three Communities

Drawing on rich longitudinal data covering a period of more than 15 years, our study highlights specific affective and non-financial components of the entrepreneurial process in the context of community- based entrepreneurship (CBE). Without an understanding of the concrete role of the community in exit, re-entry, and growth, community members of such ventures may lack the awareness and resources to engage in a perennial venture. Despite the importance of community ventures in fostering economic development and growth, little is known about the antecedents, context and processes of entrepreneurial exit and re-entry in the realm of CBE. We, therefore, address this gap through an in-depth case study of a community-based initiative in the Cauca region of Colombia. We investigate how three distinct cultural communities reach successful collaboration after overcoming an initial organizational death. Our findings illustrate that exit was the result of several factors including the lack of a strong sense of community identity. However, over time the community members developed a solid sense of belonging, trust and reliance as they tackled difficult events such as exit and market struggles on one hand and engaged in positive community building events on the other hand. Moreover, the sense of belonging that the three different communities developed are comparable to a unique extended family business, whereby the non-financial aspects of the enterprise meet the communities’ affective needs. We term this affective component “community socio-emotional wealth”

Intermediation for technology diffusion and user innovation in a developing rural economy:a social learning perspective

Technology intermediaries are seen as potent vehicles for addressing perennial problems in transferring technology from university to industry in developed and developing countries. This paper examines what constitutes effective user-end intermediation in a low-technology, developing economy context, which is an under-researched topic. The social learning in technological innovation framework is extended using situated learning theory in a longitudinal instrumental case study of an exemplar technology intermediation programme. The paper documents the role that academic-related research and advisory centres can play as intermediaries in brokering, facilitating and configuring technology, against the backdrop of a group of small-scale pisciculture businesses in a rural area of Colombia. In doing so, it demonstrates how technology intermediation activities can be optimized in the domestication and innofusion of technology amongst end-users. The design components featured in this instrumental case of intermediation can inform policy making and practice relating to technology transfer from university to rural industry. Future research on this subject should consider the intermediation components put forward, as well as the impact of such interventions, in different countries and industrial sectors. Such research would allow for theoretical replication and help improve technology domestication and innofusion in different contexts, especially in less-developed countries