Jeremy C. Short

The Concept of “Opportunity” in Entrepreneurship Research: Past Accomplishments and Future Challenges

Opportunity is a central concept within the entrepreneurship field, and there is now a critical mass of literature centered on the concept. The authors seek to make two main contributions to this literature. First, we provide a detailed review of research on the opportunity concept and the processes surrounding it, highlighting extant insights and future needs. Second, we describe ways that the entrepreneurship literature’s insights about the opportunity concept could be enhanced by research in other fields, both inside and outside business-related domains.

Research on Organizational Configurations: Past Accomplishments and Future Challenges:

Organizational configurations are sets of firms that are similar in terms of important characteristics. This article is intended to help close three gaps in the literature on organizational configurations. First, the authors propose clear definitions that may facilitate progress in the literature. Second, they provide the first major review since 1993 of accomplishments and struggles within organizational configurations research. Third, they describe how the configurational approach to organizations can make greater contributions within its traditional domains of organization theory and strategic management and can be extended to inform areas such as human resource management, organizational behavior, ethics, entrepreneurship, and international business.

Construct validation using computer-aided text analysis (CATA): An illustration using entrepreneurial orientation

Construct validity continues to pose challenges in the organizational sciences. To capture difficult-to-measure constructs of interest, researchers have often relied on content analysis. One content analysis technique, computer-aided text analysis (CATA), is particularly attractive because of the ability to process large samples with high speeds and reliabilities. Unfortunately, inconsistent guidance exists to guide researchers through the use of this tool in a manner compatible with accepted methods used to validate constructs in a rigorous manner. The authors review research using content analysis to examine the extent to which such studies integrate methods for assessing content, external, discriminant, and predictive validity. To provide direction for organizational researchers interested in using CATA to measure theoretically based constructs relevant to the management field, they suggest a number of possible procedures to enhance construct validity. They illustrate these procedures using the construct of entrepreneurial orientation.

Family Firms and Entrepreneurial Orientation in Publicly Traded Firms A Comparative Analysis of the S&P 500

There is considerable disagreement about whether family firm characteristics hinder or support entrepreneurial activities. This article highlights the existence of an entrepreneurial orientation in family firms, and it examines differences between family and nonfamily firms on the entrepreneurial orientation dimensions of autonomy, competitive aggressiveness, innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk taking, using content analysis of shareholder letters from S&P 500 firms. As such, family firms exhibit language consistent with an entrepreneurial orientation for all dimensions but use less language than that of nonfamily firms in relation to autonomy, proactiveness, and risk taking.

Dual Identities in Social Ventures: An Exploratory Study

Drawing on the organizational identity literature, this exploratory study examines the dual identities of award–winning social ventures recognized by FastCompany magazine and the Skoll Foundation. Specifically, we use computer–assisted content analysis to explore identities as reflected in organizational mission statements. Our findings demonstrate that these externally recognized social ventures do exhibit dual identities—a utilitarian organizational identity (i.e., entrepreneurial, product oriented) and a normative organizational identity (i.e., social, people oriented). Further, when compared with the mission statements of other high–performing entrepreneurial enterprises culled from the Inc. 500, our post hoc analysis suggests that social ventures manifest a greater normative identity and an equivalent utilitarian identity.

The Application of DICTION to Content Analysis Research in Strategic Management

DICTION is a computer-aided content analysis program grounded in a number of theoretical bases in linguistic research. DICTION has a number of attractive features that could be used to analyze unique elements of language in narrative texts germane to strategic management research. The authors apply the DICTION software to a sample of mission statements from 408 Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business colleges of business with a focus on gaining insights concerning how DICTION can be used in strategic management research utilizing content analysis. They find significant differences in word usage in mission statements based on organizational characteristics, including business school performance. They conclude with suggestions for future research.

The Role of Sampling in Strategic Management Research on Performance: A Two-Study Analysis

Strategic management researchers often note the inability of many phenomena to consistently explain organizational performance. Using a two-study format, we examine the possibility that sampling practices may contribute to this inability. We chronicle sampling practices within 437 studies investigating the determinants of organizational performance published between 1980 and 1999 in the Academy of Management Journal, Administrative Science Quarterly, Journal of Management, Organization Science, and Strategic Management Journal. Our results reveal that fewer than one in five studies rely on a random sample and that researchers offer little a priori acknowledgement of sample limitations. Although the first study suggests that sampling issues have been problematic, it cannot offer direct evidence. Thus, in the second study, we examine the effect of sample selection on empirical results by testing one popular relationship from the strategy literature (chief executive officer duality and performance) using fou...

Crowdfunding in a Prosocial Microlending Environment: Examining the Role of Intrinsic Versus Extrinsic Cues

Microloans garnered from crowdfunding provide an important source of financial capital for nascent entrepreneurs. Drawing on cognitive evaluation theory, we assess how linguistic cues known to affect underlying motivation can frame entrepreneurial narratives either as a business opportunity or as an opportunity to help others. We examine how this framing affects fundraising outcomes in the context of prosocial lending and conduct our analysis on a sample of microloans made to over 36,000 entrepreneurs in 51 countries via an online crowdfunding platform. We find that lenders respond positively to narratives highlighting the venture as an opportunity to help others, and less positively when the narrative is framed as a business opportunity.

Antecedents and Consequences of Franchising: Past Accomplishments and Future Challenges

Franchising is a popular and multifaceted business arrangement that has attracted considerable research attention. Past inquiry has focused on franchising’s antecedents, consequences, and factors that moderate these relationships. The authors review recent progress within franchising research and identify gaps in the literature. They also describe how researchers could build greater knowledge about franchising by further leveraging various organizational theories and by drawing from a number of business and social science fields whose insights have not yet significantly influenced franchising research.

Walking New Avenues in Management Research Methods and Theories: Bridging Micro and Macro Domains

One of the most critical challenges faced by management scholars is how to integrate micro and macro research methods and theories. This article introduces a special issue of the Journal of Management addressing this integration challenge. First, the authors describe the nature of the micro—macro divide and its challenge for the field of management. Second, the authors provide a summary of each of the four guest editorials and seven articles published in the special issue and how each piece, in its own unique way and adopting a different perspective, makes a novel contribution toward addressing this challenge. Finally, they offer suggestions for future research that they hope will stimulate greater integration of management research with the goal of bridging not only the micro—macro gap but also the science—practice gap.