Helen Haugh

Social Bricolage: Theorizing Social Value Creation in Social Enterprises

Current theorizations of bricolage in entrepreneurship studies require refinement and development to be used as a theoretical framework for social entrepreneurship. Our analysis traces bricolages conceptual underpinnings from various disciplines, identifying its key constructs as making do, a refusal to be constrained by limitations, and improvisation. Although these characteristics appear to epitomize the process of creating social enterprises, our research identifies three further constructs associated with social entrepreneurship: social value creation, stakeholder participation, and persuasion. Using data from a qualitative study of eight U.K. social enterprises, we apply the bricolage concept to social entrepreneurial action and propose an extended theoretical framework of social bricolage.

Social Enterprises as Hybrid Organizations: A Review and Research Agenda†

The impacts of the global economic crisis of 2008, the intractable problems of persistent poverty and environmental change have focused attention on organizations that combine enterprise with an embedded social purpose. Scholarly interest in social enterprise (SE) has progressed beyond the early focus on definitions and context to investigate their management and performance. From a review of the SE literature, the authors identify hybridity, the pursuit of the dual mission of financial sustainability and social purpose, as the defining characteristic of SEs. They assess the impact of hybridity on the management of the SE mission, financial resource acquisition and human resource mobilization, and present a framework for understanding the tensions and trade‐offs resulting from hybridity. By examining the influence of dual mission and conflicting institutional logics on SE management the authors suggest future research directions for theory development for SE and hybrid organizations more generally.

A research agenda for social entrepreneurship

Purpose – To study the nature of social entrepreneurship from the viewpoint of activities associated with the perception of opportunities to create social value and the creation of social purpose organizations to pursue them.Design/methodology/approach – The ways in which social enterprises adopt financially sustainable strategies to pursue social aims and address a wide a range of social problems, such as unemployment and inequalities in access to health and social care services, are discussed. Applies the results of existing research to summarize the size of the social enterprise sector in the UK, Europe and US. Proposes eight research themes for social enterprises research and endorses the need for researchers to build on current knowledge and to work together to generate a theory and produce valid, reliable and comparable data capable of being shared by researchers, policy makers and those with an interest in social entrepreneurship.Findings – The eight research themes identified by the study comprise...

Community-Led Social Venture Creation

The addition of new enterprises to the economy has long been considered essential to economic growth. The process of venture creation in the private sector has been heavily researched and frequently modeled, although few models explain the process of nonprofit enterprise creation. Nonprofit social ventures pursue economic, social, or environmental aims, generating at least part of their income from trading. They fill market gaps between private enterprise and public sector provision, and, increasingly, policy makers consider them to be valuable agents in social, economic, and environmental regeneration and renewal. This article presents findings from a qualitative study of the inception of five community–led nonprofit social ventures, producing a model of the stages of venture creation: (1) opportunity identification, (2) idea articulation, (3) idea ownership, (4) stakeholder mobilization, (5) opportunity exploitation, and (6) stakeholder reflection. A formal support network and a tailor–made support network are also part of the model, contributing resources to the new venture and assisting progression through the stages. The model highlights the resource acquisition and network creation that precede formal venture creation. In the nonprofit sector, these activities are undertaken by volunteers who do not have a controlling interest in the new venture. For practitioners, the model identifies critical stages in the process of community–led social venture creation and two areas where assistance is most needed: pre–venture business support and postcreating effective networks.

The Dialectic of Social Exchange: Theorizing Corporate—Social Enterprise Collaboration:

We augment social exchange theory with dialectical theory to build a framework to examine corporate—social enterprise collaborations. These cross-sector collaborations represent a novel form of political-economic arrangement seeking to reconcile the efficient functioning of markets with the welfare of communities. We propose that corporate—social enterprise collaborations are shaped by (1) the value that each member of the collaboration attributes to their partner’s inputs, (2) competing practices and priorities intrinsic to the corporation and the social enterprise, and (3) expected benefits of the collaboration to each partner. For a synthesized state of collaboration to emerge and the partnership to be sustained, we posit that the antithetical forces inherent within the relationship must be resolved.

The importance of theory in social enterprise research

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to review the importance of theory in social enterprise research.Design/methodology/approach – The article presents and relates previous work on theory borrowing, theory extension and theory generation to social enterprise research.Findings – Theoretical embeddeness and social relevance are important for the legitimacy of social enterprise research.Research limitations/implications – Social enterprise research offers a promising array of opportunities for theory extension and development.Practical implications – In the social sciences, practical relevance is important for good theory development. Better theories have the potential to improve practice.Originality/value – The article applies previous research on theory borrowing, extension and development to the context of social enterprise research.

The Cultural Paradigm of the Smaller Firm

This paper presents the findings from an ethnographic study of organizational culture and shared values in four smaller firms, the outcome of which was the identification of the cultural values shared between owner–managers (OMs) and employees in each firm. The research employed Scheins conceptualization of culture as a three‐layer phenomenon, consisting of surface artifacts, shared values and beliefs, and basic assumptions. The analytical technique of grounded theory was employed to process the large volume of data gathered during the extended research period. The data reveal a complex array of values in each firm, with only one firm exhibiting a homogenous culture where values are shared by all those working in the organization. In the remaining three firms, five values appear to be shared by all employees; however, this is overlaid by a pattern of subcultures differentiated by distinctive shared values. Interfirm analysis among the four firms found that the values of survival, independence, control, pragmatism, and financial prudence were shared by two or more firms. The research collectively defines these shared values as the cultural paradigm of the smaller firm.

Social Enterprise: Beyond Economic Outcomes and Individual Returns

The study reported in this chapter examines the outcomes and impact of social entrepreneurship (SE). The extent of entrepreneurial activity in an economy can be measured in terms of antecedents (contextual factors associated with entrepreneurship), process (the extent of opportunity spotting and resource acquisition) and outcomes.

Community entrepreneurship in north east Scotland

Investigates an example of group entreprenuership as found in a project promoting social and economic regeneration in economically fragile communities in north east Scotland. Encouraging entrepreneurship in community groups is the basis of the Villages in Control (ViC) project introduced in north east Scotland in 1993. ViC was a joint initiative between the local authorities of the region and the Local Enterprise Company (LEC) and was aimed at encouraging rural and coastal communities to diversify away from existing economic patterns. The objective of ViC was to encourage entrepreneurial activity at community level through a process which involved a group of individuals from each village developing and implementing a strategic plan for the economic regeneration of their own community. Using one community as an example, the paper discusses the experiences and impact of ViC and illustrates the entrepreneurial ventures generated by the community group. The paper emphasizes the importance of co‐ordinating community members into a recognisable group in order to produce the community strategic document, and also for the ideas for economic regeneration to come from the group itself. The discussion concludes that developing community entrepreneurship requires a supportive infra‐structure and a long term commitment of people and resources to facilitate the process of releasing the entrepreneurial spirit of each individual community.

Strategic entrepreneurship and small firm growth in Ghana

Using concepts derived from strategic entrepreneurship, this article discusses small firm growth models and investigates the determinants of small firm growth in Ghana. The study develops hypotheses that relate firm growth to investment in research and development, human capital, social capital, innovation and exporting. Using data from a sample of 441 entrepreneurs, the study develops ordinary least square regression models to test the hypotheses. The models find several positive relationships between firm growth and the characteristics of the entrepreneur, firm resources and firm strategy, and in so doing provide some support from a developing country for the strategic entrepreneurship framework.