Entrepreneurial exit, ability and engagement across countries in different stages of development

Abstract

Entrepreneurial ability has been suggested to be an important predictor of entrepreneurial engagement. In this paper we investigate the extent to which different types of recent entrepreneurial exit experiences foster entrepreneurial ability and subsequent entrepreneurial engagement. We discriminate between several exit modes and distinguish the following engagement levels: potential, intentional, nascent, young and established entrepreneurship. We use individual-level data for 67 countries that participated in the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor during 2007, 2008 and 2009. Our findings indeed show that entrepreneurial exit directly fosters entrepreneurial engagement as well as indirectly through enhanced entrepreneurial ability. We also find dat positive as well as negative exit experiences foster subsequent entrepreneurial engagement. In addition, the impacts of exit on ability and exit on engagement increase with the stage of development of a country.