Susanne Schlepphorst

Crisis and turnaround management in SMEs: a qualitative-empirical investigation of 30 companies

During their life cycles, many companies are confronted with crisis. The aim of this paper is to empirically test theoretical approaches in the case of 30 small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) from Germany. The presented explorative study contributes gaining a deeper insight how these companies deal with crisis. The interviews were analysed by the qualitative method GABEK that transforms abstract individual unstructured and unorganised texts onto a collective level. Among others, the results show that the personal contact to stakeholders is an added value of SMEs because of their size in order to manage and overcome crisis. Finally, it is shown that crisis can be best overcome by focusing on the core business and growth, in addition to job cuts and reduction of working time.

Repatriates as entrepreneurs? – A theoretical analysis

This contribution raises the question as to whether repatriates may pursue entrepreneurship and aims to theoretically determine if repatriates are particularly suitable candidates for venturing into self-employment. To address this research question, the Jack-of-all trades view and the human and social capital theories are employed. Research shows that insufficient repatriation strategies in international firms, lead these usually qualified, skilled and experienced employees to change employers after an international assignment. Clear insights into whether they also opt for self-employment as a career path are unavailable. To investigate this prospect, the opportunity recognition and development approach is applied because the realisation and exploitation of market opportunities is a precondition for venturing into self-employment. The above named theories are also employed to compare repatriates and start-up entrepreneurs as they have been found to facilitate the identification and exploitation of ideas. Profile similarities are found to prevail thus supporting our proposition.

Business Transferability Chances: Does the Gender of the Owner-Manager Matter?

In this chapter, we examine the question of whether possible differences in the economic behavior and development of female- and male-led family enterprises prior to successions affect their transferability to the next generation. Using large-scale panel data, we find no general gender-specific differences in economic behavior in the pre-transfer phase, except the fact that women tend to invest less in capacity expansion and generate less turnover. These differences however are not the case in the profit situation of men- and women-led enterprises. Accordingly, men- and women-led enterprises do not differ in anticipating existence-threatening problems in the course of the business succession process. Differences in investment behavior therefore do not seem to harm the transfer process, although structural differences, including the company size or industry affiliation might.

The Effect of International Assignments on Entrepreneurial Intentions among Employees

This study determines the effect of international assignments on the entrepreneurial intentions of employees. With evidence in the literature that international assignments facilitate the developme...