Social capital of venture capitalists and start-up funding

How does the social capital of venture capitalists (VCs) affect the funding of start-ups? By building on the rich social capital literature, we hypothesize a positive effect of VCs' social capital, derived from past syndication, on the amount of money that start-ups receive. Specifically, we argue that both structural and relational aspects of VCs' social networks provide VCs with superior access to information about current investment objects and opportunities to leverage them in the future, increasing their willingness to invest in these firms. Our empirical results, derived from a novel dataset containing more than 1,500 first funding rounds in the Internet and IT sector, strongly confirm our hypotheses. We discuss the implications of our findings for theories of venture capital and entrepreneurship, showing that the role and effect of VCs' social capital on start-up firms may be more complex than previously argued in the literature

Learning from Role Models in Early-Stage Entrepreneurship: A Qualitative Processual Analysis

Meeting abstract of a paper presented at the AOM Conference, 2019, .Role models have received substantial attention in the field of entrepreneurship. While much of researchers’ interest has been on the influence of role models on the decision to engage entrepreneurial activity, less is known about how and what is learned from them after one has become an entrepreneur. Through a qualitative, grounded-theory approach, this study explores the process and content dimensions of entrepreneurial learning from role models throughout the start-up process. Drawing on thirteen in-depth semi-structured interviews, the study shows how the attributes of role models and the related learning outcomes change throughout the start-up. Findings portray a learning process consisting of three major episodes in which nascent entrepreneurs identify, compare and empathize with different attributes of role models thereby accessing a variety of learning outcomes

Scott A. Shane: winner of the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research

Entrepreneurship Award Winner, Theory development, Methodological development, Entrepreneurship, G24, L26, M13, O31,