The characterization of how entrepreneurial a region or country is, has generally been shaped by a narrow view of what actually constitutes entrepreneurship. In the case of Germany, this has led to a characterization of Germany as not... more
The characterization of how entrepreneurial a region or country is, has generally been shaped by a narrow view of what actually constitutes entrepreneurship. In the case of Germany, this has led to a characterization of Germany as not being particularly entrepreneurial. Such a view is at odds with the remarkable, high-performing family business, widely held to be the backbone of the economy. The purpose of this paper is to suggest that the interpretation prevalent in entrepreneurship literature is problematic due to a too narrow operationalization of the entrepreneurship concept. As Zahra (2007; 2014) emphasized, context matters for entrepreneurship, especially on a local or spatial level. One particular organizational manifestation of entrepreneurship, family business, may be congruent in specific spatial and institutional contexts but not in others. Other geographic and institutional contexts may be congruent with the contrasting startups. Thus, an important and novel contribution...
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The question why venture capitalists syndicate their deals has been attracting growing attention. The paper analyses how the motives of two types of venture capitalists do differ. Focusing on information costs it expects that venture... more
The question why venture capitalists syndicate their deals has been attracting growing attention. The paper analyses how the motives of two types of venture capitalists do differ. Focusing on information costs it expects that venture capitalists with the standard basic know-how in founding and financing new enterprises syndicate to get access to specific knowledge while venture capitalists with specific knowledge concerning a certain industry or financing stage syndicate to get access to deal flow. Hypotheses are tested via a dataset of 103 venture capitalists in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland. CORRESPONDING AUTHOR Carola Jungwirth, Chair of Strategic Management and Business Policy, Plattenstrasse 14, 8032 Zurich, Switzerland. E-mail: carola.jungwirth@isu.unizh.ch
Im Kontext wirtschaftlicher Globalisierungsprozesse wird das Auslandsstudium als immer wichtiger erachtet. Fachspezifische Unterschiede werden in der Literatur hierbei haufig uber Einstellungsdifferenzen erklart. Systematische empirische... more
Im Kontext wirtschaftlicher Globalisierungsprozesse wird das Auslandsstudium als immer wichtiger erachtet. Fachspezifische Unterschiede werden in der Literatur hierbei haufig uber Einstellungsdifferenzen erklart. Systematische empirische Uberprufungen finden sich indes selten. In dem Beitrag wird mithilfe einfacher handlungstheoretischer Uberlegungen argumentiert, dass fachspezifische Unterschiede im Auslandsstudium auf unterschiedlichen Nutzenerwartungen beruhen. Mithilfe von Daten aus einer PAPI-Umfrage unter Studierenden der Wirtschafts- und Ingenieurwissenschaften der Universitat Siegen werden die Annahmen vorlaufig gepruft. Im Ergebnis zeigt sich, dass die fachspezifischen Unterschiede in der Intention zum Auslandsstudium auch auf unterschiedliche Nutzenerwartungen der Studierenden zuruckzufuhren sind.
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Innovativen Wachstumsunternehmen steht mit dem Crowdinvesting in Deutschland seit 2011 eine neuartige Finanzierungsmethode zur Verfugung. Hierbei versuchen die meist jungen Unternehmen durch einen gezielten offentlichen Aufruf eine breite... more
Innovativen Wachstumsunternehmen steht mit dem Crowdinvesting in Deutschland seit 2011 eine neuartige Finanzierungsmethode zur Verfugung. Hierbei versuchen die meist jungen Unternehmen durch einen gezielten offentlichen Aufruf eine breite Masse privater Investoren anzusprechen. Basierend auf einer umfangreichen Datenbank sowie einer Unternehmensbefragung zeigen wir erste Entwicklungslinien eines im Wachstum begriffenen Marktes auf. Dabei wird deutlich, dass Unternehmer sich im Vorfeld bewusst fur das Crowdinvesting entscheiden, obwohl ihnen Alternativen zur Verfugung stehen. Allgemein harmoniert die Finanzierungsform dabei mit etablierten Arten der Fruhphasenfinanzierung. Zudem ist festzustellen, dass die Bestandsfestigkeit der Unternehmen zwar oberhalb des Bundesdurchschnitts liegt, die zum Finanzierungszeitpunkt getroffenen Prognosen jedoch verfehlt werden.
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Signaling theory has been widely used to explain phenomena in personnel selection processes. The present study adds to this perspective on personnel selection by applying signaling theory to personnel selection processes in family firms,... more
Signaling theory has been widely used to explain phenomena in personnel selection processes. The present study adds to this perspective on personnel selection by applying signaling theory to personnel selection processes in family firms, focusing on the selection of internal successors. We investigate if and how signaling takes place in these processes. We apply a multiple case study approach using interview data from twenty German family firms. We find that signaling does take place in these processes and build propositions related to the signals sent, the signaling frame, and the signaling game. We find that predecessor and potential successors exchange signals over a long period of time to reduce information asymmetries and legitimate the selection of a successor. Moreover, we show that signals are sent in the family context as well as in business context and change over time. We identify hard to fake and costly signals and discuss how these signals and the signaling game influence the internal successor selection process. We further discuss implications and limitations of the present study.
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Aus der Analyse des Forschungsstandes und aus den theoretischen Uberlegungen kann angenommen werden, dass eine Beziehung zwischen Investitionen in Humankapital und dem Grundungserfolg besteht. Im Folgenden widmet sich daher das... more
Aus der Analyse des Forschungsstandes und aus den theoretischen Uberlegungen kann angenommen werden, dass eine Beziehung zwischen Investitionen in Humankapital und dem Grundungserfolg besteht. Im Folgenden widmet sich daher das vorliegende vierte Kapitel der Analyse, ob empirische Befunde die Evidenz fur die aufgestellte Vermutung des Zusammenhangs von Investitionen in Humankapital und Grundungserfolg liefern und somit die Humankapitaltheorie einen erkenntnissteigernden Beitrag innerhalb der Grundungs- und Erfolgsfaktorenforschung liefern kann. Daruber hinaus ist es von grosem Untersuchungsinteresse, welche partiellen und komplementaren Effekte sich in Bezug auf unterschiedliche Erfolgsindikatoren zeigen, d.h., welche Investitionen in Humankapital und vor allem welche Kombinationen den starksten Einfluss generieren und welche von geringerem Belang sind. Nachfolgend wird daher zunachst auf die Datenbasis fur die empirische Untersuchung eingegangen. Im Anschluss daran folgen die Operationalisierung der zu untersuchenden Variablen und schlieslich die empirische Uberprufung der aufgestellten Hypothesen.
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Das Thema Unternehmensgrundungen von Akademikern wurde in der Vergangenheit bereits von zahlreichen Autoren u ntersucht. Der uberwiegende Teil der Studien legt den Fokus der Analyse auf die personlichen und umfeldbedingten... more
Das Thema Unternehmensgrundungen von Akademikern wurde in der Vergangenheit bereits von zahlreichen Autoren u ntersucht. Der uberwiegende Teil der Studien legt den Fokus der Analyse auf die personlichen und umfeldbedingten Einflussfaktoren, das Existenzgrundungsangebot an Hochschulen und den beruflichen Verbleib der Absolventen. Unter Studien werden in diesem Kontext isolierbare Einzelerhebungen verstanden. Insgesamt wurden 21 Erhebungen in die Betrachtung miteinbezogen, deren Ergebnisse in vielerlei Hinsicht betrachtliche Varianzen aufweisen.
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The paper presents two computer-supported learning environments which are built on top metadata defined in XML; a comprehensive study environment for a Talmudic tractate and a video based learning environment called Virtual... more
The paper presents two computer-supported learning environments which are built on top metadata defined in XML; a comprehensive study environment for a Talmudic tractate and a video based learning environment called Virtual Entrepreneurship lab used in entrepreneurship education. While expressive metadata standards like MPEG-7 help us technically to implement multimedia learning environments by offering comprehensive coverage of all needed aspects, the century spanning editing process of knowledge ...
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... literature. An overview about the literature addressing religious economics in ... However, Elvira was a local council which affected only the Iberian part of the church. A more general ... Up to the fifth century Roman culture... more
... literature. An overview about the literature addressing religious economics in ... However, Elvira was a local council which affected only the Iberian part of the church. A more general ... Up to the fifth century Roman culture dominated the Catholic Church. The ...
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Entrepreneurship has been claimed to matter and deserve priority because it has been linked to some of the most compelling economic and social issues of our time. This paper suggests that entrepreneurship is also inextricably linked to a... more
Entrepreneurship has been claimed to matter and deserve priority because it has been linked to some of the most compelling economic and social issues of our time. This paper suggests that entrepreneurship is also inextricably linked to a fundamental value common among the western developed economies, democracy. Three distinct contexts are examined to link democracy to entrepreneurship, two historical and one contemporary. The first is National Socialism in Germany, which emerged by suppressing both entrepreneurship and democracy. The second is the rise of the Trusts, or dominant large corporations and concomitant decline of small business in the United States at the end of the nineteenth century. Finally, both measurement and perception suggest a decline in democracy as well as entrepreneurship in the contemporary era. These concerns are only exacerbated in the current Covid-19 crisis. The paper concludes that an important policy mandate for entrepreneurship may be to ensure the ind...
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Die Papier GmbH ist ein Familienunternehmen, das sich in vielerlei Hinsicht im Umbruch befindet. Einerseits fuhren Probleme innerhalb der Familie zu Streitigkeiten im Nachfolgeprozess, andererseits fuhrt ein veraltetes Produktportfolio... more
Die Papier GmbH ist ein Familienunternehmen, das sich in vielerlei Hinsicht im Umbruch befindet. Einerseits fuhren Probleme innerhalb der Familie zu Streitigkeiten im Nachfolgeprozess, andererseits fuhrt ein veraltetes Produktportfolio und der steigende Druck der Digitalisierung zu sinkendem Umsatz. Das Unternehmen wird bis jetzt durch den konservativen und patriarchal gepragten Vater gefuhrt, welcher eigentlich den Ruhestand antreten mochte. Eine interne Ubergabe an die Kinder ware moglich, wird jedoch durch unterschiedliche Zielsetzungen und Verhaltensweisen der einzelnen Parteien erschwert. Die Tochter, motiviert das Unternehmen weiterzufuhren, wunscht sich aufgrund ihres akademischen Hintergrunds radikale Anderungen, welche nicht mit dem Unternehmensleitbild des Vaters ubereinstimmen. Der Sohn, bereits im Betrieb etabliert, geniest eine komfortable Stellung im Unternehmen und hinterfragt den Status Quo nicht. Die Familiensituation und das Unternehmen sind gezeichnet durch den Ko...
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We follow the general extension of agency theory discussion concerning family businesses to gain deeper insights into the underlying information asymmetries in family businesses. By doing so, we ob...
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Kaficho is the youngest of three Ethiopians, from an outspoken family who were engaged in political clashes with the government. His journey to refuge is unique in the sense that he undertook postgraduate studies in Germany, returning to... more
Kaficho is the youngest of three Ethiopians, from an outspoken family who were engaged in political clashes with the government. His journey to refuge is unique in the sense that he undertook postgraduate studies in Germany, returning to Ethiopia with the intention of starting a family there with his wife. As his tourism company grew, when he returned to it in 2010, he entered into partnership. He also held a position at a university near Addis Ababa, but soon started to face political pressure to join the ruling party or suffer the consequences. In 2013, this pressure led him to abandon the idea of staying in Ethiopia, and he fled the country, successfully immigrating into Germany. Not being able to find employment in Heidelberg, he established “Kaficho Trading” in 2015, which is a transnational business-to-business sole proprietorship for small machinery and coffee.
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This study examines the influence of organizational psychological capital on the performance of small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) during crises. We argue that SMEs use their intangible resources to cope with difficult situations... more
This study examines the influence of organizational psychological capital on the performance of small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) during crises. We argue that SMEs use their intangible resources to cope with difficult situations such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, we investigate how organizational psychological capital impacts performance and creative innovation through such intangible resources, namely, organizational citizenship behavior, solidarity, and cooperation. Methodologically, we combine structural equation modelling and regression analysis on a dataset of 379 SMEs. Our results support the notion that organizational psychological capital positively influences creative innovation of SMEs and thus performance during crises. Our research contributes to the organizational behavior literature by showing that psychological resources of SMEs can strengthen performance in times of crisis and help to prepare for future ones.
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PurposeDrawing on human capital (HC) and social capital (SC) as well as the Jack-of-all-trades theory, this paper aims to clarify the relationship between international assignments (IAs) of employees and their entrepreneurial intentions.... more
PurposeDrawing on human capital (HC) and social capital (SC) as well as the Jack-of-all-trades theory, this paper aims to clarify the relationship between international assignments (IAs) of employees and their entrepreneurial intentions. The study proposes that such IAs provide specific environmental features which may enable employees to build up diverse skills and network relations conducive to entrepreneuship.Design/methodology/approachThe authors collected data using an online survey, targeting professionals and managers in Germany and Switzerland. They used 223 complete responses. Before data collection, they ensured the suitability of their questionnaire by employing well-tested scales and consulted independent experts in survey design and methodology. They tested their hypotheses by applying multiple mediation modeling.FindingsAs hypothesized, the authors find empirical evidence that diverse skills and network relationships as well as poor career prospects, positively mediate...
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University spin-offs (USOs) are an important driver for innovation, along with economic and social development. Hence, understanding which factors help them perform successfully is crucial, especially regarding their peculiarities in a... more
University spin-offs (USOs) are an important driver for innovation, along with economic and social development. Hence, understanding which factors help them perform successfully is crucial, especially regarding their peculiarities in a scientific environment. This study focuses on essential factors such as team composition and diversity in USOs in the biotech sector in 64 founding teams in Switzerland and Germany. By identifying the team composition, and going beyond the usual team characteristics, along with checking in parallel for network and financing effects, the paper adds empirical evidence to the ongoing debate if and how team diversity in USOs affects the performance of this special group of newly founded firms. We test our hypotheses with the partial least squares method (PLS). Our results from the mediation model show how the diversity of teams is related to networks and financial resources and affects the performance. In addition, our study reveals the direct and indirec...
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This study examines the influence of individual owner-manager values on the different dimensions of socioemotional wealth in family firms. We argue that values of owner-managers in family firms are one of the underlying motivators for... more
This study examines the influence of individual owner-manager values on the different dimensions of socioemotional wealth in family firms. We argue that values of owner-managers in family firms are one of the underlying motivators for socioemotional wealth behavior and used structural equation modeling to test the assumed connection. The results of our data set with 1,003 cases show, in accordance with Schwartz’s value dimensions, that social- and person-oriented values influence different dimensions of the FIBER scale. Our findings help understand the importance of individual values, advance socioemotional wealth research, and contribute to the understanding of family firm behavior.
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The often long-lasting process of intrafamily business succession involves contracts for management and ownership transfer that unfold in a complex series of stages. The older and larger a family business, the more heterogeneous the... more
The often long-lasting process of intrafamily business succession involves contracts for management and ownership transfer that unfold in a complex series of stages. The older and larger a family business, the more heterogeneous the involved family members’ interactions and interests can become. These differences become obvious in the succession process. Also, in entrepreneurial families, information is not easy to obtain and is neither perfect nor unlimited, for example, with regard to expectations regarding the duration or the type of business succession. Information asymmetries can arise. This article investigates the drivers of information asymmetries and provides insight into the current research by investigating information asymmetries and their impact during different phases of intrafamily business succession. Data from 215 German firms reveal the occurrence of specific information asymmetries during different phases of intrafamily business succession. JEL CLASSIFICATION M1; ...
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ABSTRACT The advantage of specialisation in venture capital financing makes the presence of generalists perplexing. In order to understand their function, the authors investigate the knowledge resource bases of both generalists and... more
ABSTRACT The advantage of specialisation in venture capital financing makes the presence of generalists perplexing. In order to understand their function, the authors investigate the knowledge resource bases of both generalists and specialists, the types of enterprises they select, and their corresponding support strategies. Arguing that differences in strategy can be attributed to differences in knowledge, the authors hypothesise that specialists select high-tech projects — generalists, on the other hand, select low-tech projects. Specialists support ‘hands-off’ — generalist support ‘hands-on’. These hypotheses are tested with a dataset of 103 venture capitalists in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland. The empirical results from OLS-regressions show a close relationship between knowledge and selection as well as support strategies. These results invite further research on differences in venture capitalists’ strategies as they relate to differences in knowledge.
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1. Current situation and basic idea Constant growth in economic internationalisation prompts major corporations and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) alike to recruit adequate ranks of qualified employees. Moreover, companies have... more
1. Current situation and basic idea Constant growth in economic internationalisation prompts major corporations and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) alike to recruit adequate ranks of qualified employees. Moreover, companies have to retain these employees - in the bids to survive in the marketplace and in the face of competition. In this context, companies vie for with one another for