Francis J. Greene

The Effects of Experience on Entrepreneurial Optimism and Uncertainty

This paper develops an occupational choice model in which entrepreneurs, who are initially uncertain about their true talent, learn from experience. As a consequence, both optimistic bias in talent beliefs and uncertainty diminish with experience. The model gives rise naturally to a heteroscedastic probit estimator of occupational choices, in contrast to the commonly used homoscedastic estimator. The model is applied to British data on self-employment and optimism for the period 1984-99. The empirical analysis supports the main propositions of the model: principally, entrepreneurs are found to be more optimistic than employees, and both optimism and uncertainty diminish with experience.

The role of higher education skills and support in graduate self‐employment

This article examines the career progression of self‐employed graduates immediately following graduation and four years subsequently. Using a career socialization theory specific to entrepreneurial settings, it links the role of skills acquired in UK higher education courses and the use of support with self‐employment outcomes. Using a wide range of controls (e.g. individual background, prior education, career orientations), the article finds that higher education is initially important in supporting graduate self‐employment, but that this support decays in value.

The determinants and growth implications of venture creation speed

Time is central to our understanding of entrepreneurship. However, while prior research has shown a general link between decision speed and venture performance, little is known about what factors influence the speed of venture creation. Equally, little research has been conducted on how venture creation speed impacts on venture growth. This paper examines the determinants and growth implications of venture creation speed from a social constructionist perspective, which sees that time both shapes and is shaped by individuals, social contexts and spatial structures. We, therefore, investigate the influence of entrepreneurial characteristics, external support, institutional influences and the regional context in which venture creation speed occurs and subsequently impacts on growth in new ventures. Results from structured interviews with 381 active de novo entrepreneurs in Catalonia (Spain) show a positive relationship between prior entrepreneurial experience and speed. Interestingly, support from potential suppliers and customers is useful not only for speed but also for the subsequent growth of the venture. In contrast, business planning retards venture creation and fails to lead to an improvement in growth. Results also indicate a positive, but weak, relationship between speed and growth, once entrepreneurial, environmental and venture characteristics are held constant. The paper subsequently discusses these findings and suggests further research directions and practical implications.

Recasting the city into city-regions: Place promotion, competitiveness benchmarking and the quest for urban supremacy

This essay critically examines twenty-two studies designed to measure the competitiveness of cities and city-regions. We suggest that while this research may show statistical correlations between different dimensions of competitiveness, there is little in the way of causation. More fundamentally, our main point is to question the utility of such studies. Regional disparities in terms of wealth and living standards are well known; simply recasting the spatial scale to the city or the city-region does not change the underlying fundamentals of regional performance.

Like Mother, Like Daughter? Analyzing Maternal Influences Upon Women's Entrepreneurial Propensity

Within the phenomenon of entrepreneurship, the extant literature suggests that the normative actor is embodied by and through stereotypical masculinized characteristics. In this paper, we contextualize entrepreneurship as self–employment in order to explore how such stereotypical characterizations might influence womens attitudes toward this activity. However, rather than analyzing the confirmatory effects of stereotypes, we critically evaluate the effect of counterstereotypical characterizations upon womens propensity for self–employment. Drawing upon life–span data, we explore whether self–employed mothers disconfirm masculinized stereotypes and so act as positive role models for their daughters. As hypothesized, we found that maternal self–employment has a counterstereotypical effect and so positively influences daughters to become self–employed. These data indicate, however, that this effect is tempered by personal stereotypes held by daughters; moreover, it is shaped by significant life events (marriage, parenthood, education, and prior managerial experience). By using a robust data set, this paper contributes to our understanding of how stereotypes and role expectations influence womens propensity toward entrepreneurial activity.

Assessing the Impact of Policy Interventions: The Influence of Evaluation Methodology

Using the case of the Princes Trust, the preeminent UK youth enterprise programme, I investigate how different evaluation methodologies generate radically different evidence of the impact of the programme. The key result is that simpler forms of evaluation tend to provide positive support for this programme, whereas more sophisticated evaluations are not so positive. I discuss the implications of this for the way stakeholders should view evaluations. I urge caution about the claims made for programmes that receive only lighter forms of evaluation.

Venture Creation Speed and Subsequent Growth: Evidence from South America

Though time is an important dimension of the venture creation process, our understanding of why some entrepreneurs are able to act more quickly than others is limited. Equally, not much is known about the relationship between venture creation speed and the subsequent venture growth. In this paper, we use a resource‐based perspective to provide insights into the factors that quicken or retard venture creation and to explore how speed impacts on subsequent growth. This is important because the topic remains generally underresearched and because even less is understood about venture creation speed in the context of South American economies. Data were collected from face‐to‐face interviews with 647 entrepreneurs in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Peru. Using a multivariate regression framework, we find that entrepreneurs make use of their human and social capital resources to shape the speed by which their venture is created. Moreover, their perceptions of unfavorable environmental conditions seem to retard venture creation. Findings also suggest that entrepreneurs who take more time to create a more solid resource base tend to receive better growth outcomes. Implications from the findings are discussed.

An assessment of a venture creation programme: the case of Shell LiveWIRE

This paper examines the problems inherent in assessing the role of venture creation programmes. It suggests that there are, in particular, two areas to be considered. First, any assessment is contingent upon the evaluation context. In other words, not only are the objectives of any particular venture creation programme important, but also so are the objectives of the evaluation. Following on from this, it is also apparent that a simple input-output (‘black-box’) assessment is unlikely to fully capture the discontinuities or ambiguities inherent in the entrepreneurial process. To address these issues, an assessment instrument is developed to estimate the equivocal nature of the venture creation process. This 4-fold instrument suggests considering individuals in four states: individuals who use a programme but do not subsequently consider entrepreneurship to be appropriate (NO WISH); those who would countenance entrepreneurship in the future (POTENTIALS); those currently attempting to become entrepreneurs (NASCENTS); and those who are entrepreneurs (ACTUALS). Subsequently, this assessment instrument is used to consider the case of Shell LiveWIRE, which is a dedicated provider of enterprise support to young people in the UK. Based upon a sample of over 1000 young people, a probit and ordered probit analysis show that ‘soft’ forms of support (signposting and information provision) were of little value in moving individuals towards entrepreneurial activity. The research also found that the more likely an individual was to be engaged in entrepreneurial activity, the less their expressed value of LiveWIRE services.

The determinants of online loan applications from small businesses

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine both the characteristics of the business customers and the types of venture which make use of online loan applications. Despite the growth in the use of technology in banking and the advent of online banking, little research has been conducted on the factors underlying online loan application behaviour amongst business banking customers.Design/methodology/approach – A multivariate analysis is conducted on a USA dataset to empirically test the hypotheses derived in this paper. The empirical evidence is drawn from the US Survey of Small Business Finances, which contains 3,561 sample ventures, representing 5.3 million small businesses in the USA.Findings – The paper finds that online loan behaviour is largely determined by the characteristics of the entrepreneur, rather than that of the venture. It is also found that factors that trust, evident in the length of the relationship between the applicants and their primary lender, is important. Moderating these ef...

Testosterone is associated with self-employment among Australian men

Testosterone has pronounced effects on mens physiological development and smaller, more nuanced, impacts on their economic behavior. In this study of 1199 Australian adult males, we investigate the relationship between the self-employed and their serum testosterone levels. Because prior studies have identified that testosterone is a hormone that is responsive to external factors (e.g. competition, risk-taking), we explicitly control for omitted variable bias and reverse causality by using an instrumental variable approach. We use insulin as our primary instrument to account for endogeneity between testosterone and self-employment. This is because prior research has identified a relationship between insulin and testosterone but not between insulin and self-employment. Our results show that there is a positive association between total testosterone and self-employment. Robustness checks using bioavailable testosterone and another similar instrument (daily alcohol consumption) confirm this positive finding.