1- Introduction

2- Hypotheses

3- Methodology

4- Analysis and results

5- Discussion and conclusions

References

Abstract

The business founder’s social identity is crucial to explaining his or her behaviour and attitude in business decision-making. Drawing on three types of entrepreneurial social identity identified by Fauchart and Gruber (2011), this study examines how social identities influence the entrepreneur’s way of managing his/her firm and its consequences for business performance. Based on a survey of newly created firms, the results support the conclusion that effectuation channels the effects of specific identities – Darwinian and missionary – on business performance.

Introduction

The decisions the entrepreneur makes in the first years of activity are crucial, as they can limit the firm’s evolution (Boeker, 1989; Cardinal, Sitkin, & Long, 2004) and have implications for its performance (Bamford, Dean, & Douglas, 2004; Boeker, 1989; Park & Bae, 2004). Further, although entrepreneurs’ way of understanding the business in its initial stage impacts firm-level results significantly, this relationship received little study (Fern, Cardinal, & O’Neill, 2012). Contrary to what one might think, limited growth is not always associated with inability to grow; it may actually reflect the entrepreneur’s lack of desire to grow his/her firm (Cliff, 1998). For example, Baum and Locke (2004) propose that the goals businesspeople establish for firm growth are significantfactors that influence the firms. Specific findings (Barringer, Jones, & Neubaum, 2005) suggest the importance of incorporating entrepreneurs’ different attitudes and aspirations for growth in research. Our study examines the impact of these aspirations on the growth of newly created firms (Davidsson & Honig, 2003). Aspirations are desires, goals, or ambitions—something desired thatthe individual does not possess at the moment. How we want to see ourselves, or whom we wish to resemble, strongly influences our behaviour. Various studies highlight identity as an important predictor of entrepreneurs’ decisions and actions (Cardon, Wincent, Singh, & Drnovsek, 2009; Conger, York, & Wry, 2012; Hoang & Gimeno, 2010), but only a few tackle social identity in the context of entrepreneurship. Since firm creation is an inherently social activity (Whetten & Mackey, 2002), entrepreneurs’ behaviour is shaped by how they perceive themselves in relation to others (Fauchart & Gruber, 2011). Alsos, Clausen, Hytti, and Solvoll (2016) argue that a key aspect of entrepreneurship research studies the activities and behaviours undertaken (Davidsson & Honig, 2003). Itis precisely Social Identity Theory that helps us to understand and explain the heterogeneous behaviours that founders pursue in the process of setting up a firm. Although different patterns exist, these authors stress effectuation and causation as two different focuses for new firm creation (Sarasvathy, 2001)—focuses described as one ofthe mostimportant contemporary perspectives in entrepreneurship research (Fisher, 2012; Perry, Chandler, & Markova, 2012).

Abstract

International convergence of structures, processes, and practices has been suggested by a small but increasing stream of literature in the field of management, such as human resource management (HRM) (e.g., Rowley, Benson, & Warner, 2004; Zhu & Warner, 2000), business ethics and corporate governance (e.g., Brandau, Endenich, Trapp, & Hoffjan, 2013; Davis & Greve, 1997; Long & Driscoll, 2008), internationalization (e.g., Brown, 2011; Davis, Desai, & Francis, 2000), and marketing (e.g., Brouthers, O’Donnell, & Hadjimarcou, 2005; Deligonul, Elg, Cavusgil, & Ghauri, 2013; Hillebrand, Nijholt, & Nijssen, 2011). Mainly based on institutional theory, various studies have shown that coercive, normative, and mimetic pressures generally lead organizations to become convergent in their practices around the world (e.g., Ahlstrom & Bruton, 2001; Björkman, Smale, Sumelius, Suutari, & Lu, 2008; Brandau et al., 2013; Farndale & Paauwe, 2007; Huo, Han, Zhao, Zhuo, Wood, & Zhai, 2013), the process of which is defined as isomorphism (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983, 1991). Recent studies show that firms typically receive behavioral cues from and experience multiple institutional prescriptions projected by different audiences (Greenwood, Raynard, Kodeih, Micelotta, & Lounsbury, 2011; Greenwood & Meyer, 2008), and thus their practices remain divergent under the influence of institutional pressures (Hannon, Huang, & Jaw, 1995; Kraatz & Zajac, 1996; Marquis & Lounsbury, 2007; Purdy & Gray, 2009). To explain the divergence of organizational practices among firms in a field, prior research has investigated how various firm- and macro-level economic features shape firms’ responses to institutional pressures (Kraatz & Moore, 2002). For example, Marquis and Tilcsik (2013) show that firm size and macro-environmental uncertainty moderate firms’ choice of philanthropic contributions when facing industry and community institutional pressures. Li and Parboteeah (2015) find that home country culture affects a firm’s mimetic behavior as a response to institutional influences. A shortcoming of these studies is that they primarily focus on firms’ economic features while ignoring the social features. In particular, firms are embedded in social structures, as well as different social groups, and their social characteristics also significantly shape their strategic behavior (Rao, Davis, & Ward, 2000; Rao, Monin, & Durand, 2003). For example, firms may actively assess the consistency or conflicts between institutional pressures and their identity, so as to decide how much they conform to or resist institutional pressures.

The rapid proliferation and growing popularity of social media, such as online social networking sites (SNS), have been accompanied by rapid changes in consumer behavior (Lin & Lu, 2011). As of July 2012, people spend approximately 6.5 h a day on social media to socialize, share, and communicate with members of their social network (Popkin, 2012). This behavioral change toward dependence on social media has magnified dramatically. A recent study based on 170,000 Internet users in the United States revealed that an average user spends 1.72 h on social networking and another 0.81 h on microblogging each day, which respectively account for 28% and 13% of all online activities (Bennet, 2015). Such a phenomenon is more pronounced for members of “Generation Z,” who live in the digital era (Wallace, 2015). A study on this younger generation, aged between 8 and 18, shows that teens, on average, spend more than 6.5 h on screen media, whereas tweens spend more than 4.5 h (Wallace, 2015). These studies show that social media has become an integral part of the lives of many people, both adults and children (Bennet, 2015; Robb, 2015). Approximately 45% of surveyed teens use social media everyday (Robb, 2015) and some even check for more than 100 times on a daily basis (Hadad, 2015). A report shows that teen girls spend 1 h and 32 min on social media, 40 min more than boys who on average spend 52 min (Robb, 2015). A similar pattern is also observed in Taiwan, a leading economy in Asia. According to a study by the Market Intelligence & Consulting Institute (MIC), 92% of the 2187 respondents of returned surveys from its online panel have used social media recently. Among the various online social media services, Facebook still dominates the local market followed by Googleþ for social networking, while YouTube is on top as the leading online multimedia platform (MIC, 2014) for videos. Although consumers are used to incorporate social media into their daily lives to satisfy their need for networking and affiliation, majority fail to conduct consumption behavior through this new avenue (Yang, 2011). This trend of consumer behavior change coupled with the novel potential of social media to stick users with the platform have been well recognized by marketers, who now embrace it as a tool to enhance customer acquisition and management to increase sales prospects. Moreover, equipped with analytical capability, social media service providers are able to provide highly sophisticated data for advertisers to effectively target customers and tailor their product and service offerings to individual preferences. The social media giant Facebook is reported to have advertising revenue as a massive portion of its sales (DiChristopher, 2015).

در این مقاله به نقش هویت اجتماعی در تصمیمات سرمایه گذاری می‌پردازیم. هویت اجتماعی جنبه‌ای از خویشتن شناسی براساس اولویت‌های گروه و درک تعلق به یک گروه اجتماعی است. ما داده‌های نظر سنجی را از مشتریان خرده فروش تنها دو بانک در هلند که به طور انحصاری مسئول ارائه محصولات سرمایه گذاری اجتماعی و حساب‌های پس انداز هستند، جمع آوری کردیم. اطلاعات ما نشان می‌دهند که تقریباً نیمی از مشتریان منحصراً در این بانک‌ها سرمایه گذاری می‌کنند، در حالی که نیمی دیگر حداقل دارای یک حساب سرمایه گذاری معمولی هستند. مشتریان به طور گسترده‌ای به اندازه‌ای که هویت خود را با مسئولیت اجتماعی سرمایه گذاری (SRI) تعیین می‌کنند، متفاوت هستند. سرمایه گذاران با هویت اجتماعی قوی به طور قابل ملاحظه‌ای بیشتر ثروت خود را، هم از نظر یورو سرمایه گذاری شده و هم از نظر درصد کل موجودی اوراق بهادار سرمایه گذاری شده، به این بانک‌ها اختصاص می‌دهند. هویت اجتماعی نیز واسطه اثر بازده مورد انتظار بر SRI است. نتایج ما نشان می‌دهند که هویت اجتماعی در میان سرمایه گذاران با تحصیلات بیشتر، جوان‌تر و کم ثروت تر، قوی‌تر است.