Business Commons^™

Barriers And Enablers To Building Entrepreneurial Ecosystems As Perceived By Change Agents In The Workplace, Shanda Barrett

Dissertations

This study explores factors that influence entrepreneurial ecosystems. Clifton (2010, 2015) recommends entrepreneurship, better business models, and new business startups as a solution for economic renewal in the United States and specifically identifies disengaged workers and low-energy workplaces as the starting point. The recommendation does not address how to make workplaces conducive to entrepreneurial activity, nor does the recommendation address how to engage entrepreneurial employees.

Existing literature outlines the known tensions between theory, anecdotal evidence, and the professional practice of building entrepreneurial ecosystems. To date, the term entrepreneurial ecosystem exists as a metaphor in the extant literature. While scholars have …

The Impact Of Integrating An Sbdc Program Into A College/University Career Center, Harshdeep Singh Nanda

Master's Projects

With a new approach for integrating the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) program in Alameda County, the Ohlone Community College District (Ohlone College) has introduced a new model for hosting an SBDC program on a college/university campus. While many other educational institutions across the nation have hosted an SBDC program (Cook Center for Entrepreneurship - Ivy Tech Community College of Indiana, n.d.; University of Scranton Small Business Development Center (SBDC) | Helping NEPA & Northern Tier Small Businesses Start, Grow & Prosper., n.d.; Olson, 2006), most have treated the program as a separate entity or department, often leading to the …

Informing The Creation Of A Financial Literacy Tool For Cal Poly Students, Kelly Michelle Carroll

Communication Studies

This research project examines the wants, needs, and desires of Cal Poly students to inform the creation of a financial literacy tool (tentatively named “MoneySmart”) to be created by another student. The methodologies used to gauge these metrics were a literature review and questionnaire. The literature review aids in understanding research regarding the current state of student financial literacy in the United States, including student attitudes toward the topic. Subsequent findings were used to create the questionnaire, which inquired about students’ financial stress, confidence in their abilities to manage their personal finances, specific interests for the design and contents of …

The Decline Of American Entrepreneurship: An Analysis Of Causes Of Macro Market Trends And A Changing American Economic System, Owen Flomberg

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

Empowering Female Entrepreneurs Through Mentorship In Medellin, Colombia: Results From The Field, Theresa Solenski

Master's Theses

Utilizing the power of local knowledge and peer networking, this study attempts to quantify the impacts of mentorship among female micro-entrepreneurs in Medellin, Colombia on empowerment. Developing countries such as Colombia have disproportionately high rates of unprofitable micro-businesses, many of which are managed by women. Internal constraints, such as disempowerment, play a central role in perpetuating poverty. We implement a 6-month mentoring intervention by pairing 18 successful entrepreneurs with 52 disadvantaged female, micro-entrepreneurs in Medellin, Colombia to measure the additional benefit of localized knowledge to micro-borrowers. Using a process of random assignment, I measure the change in female empowerment, measured …

The Impact Of Culture On Hispanic Entrepreneurs As Mediated By Motivation, Challenge, And Success, Valerie V. Ballesteros

Theses & Dissertations

In the modern economic environment, demographic shifts in U.S. population resulting from changing immigration, changing economic policies and environments, and growing socioeconomic disparity, scholarly research examining the business behavior of specific groups and the impact of behavior on the broader marketplace is valuable and necessary. Hispanic entrepreneurs, when compared to both minority and non-minority business-owners, started and flourished in successful business ownership at a greater growth rate than any other group (Davila, Mora, & Zeitlin, 2014). Since the beginning of the 21st century, Hispanic entrepreneurs have become a measurable economic force. The cultural experience of the Hispanic entrepreneur is important …

Essays In Entrepreneurship, Innovation And Labor, Andres Gonzalo Hincapie Norena

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

I explore the role of experimentation on the career choices of individuals deciding whether to be paid employees or entrepreneurs, and on the decisions of consumers deciding what medical treatment to buy. In the labor market, experimentation entails the accumulation of information that allows individuals to improve their occupational choices. In the product market, experimentation entails discovering the quality of new products and it may have an effect on the evolution of technology: less experimentation by individuals may slow down the process of innovation. I start in Chapter 2 with the observation that most individuals do not start a business …

Examining Poverty, Entrepreneurship, And Multinational Corporation Participation In South Africa, Stephanie Furlough-Morris

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Economic development is seen as the best means of accomplishing the goal of eradicating extreme poverty, and at the heart of this development are for-profit companies, especially multinational corporations. The specific problem examined in this study was whether levels of poverty in South Africa had been significantly impacted by the activities of multinational corporations and the level of entrepreneurship in its 9 provinces. To build upon empirical research on the sources of poverty alleviation and the impact of large global enterprises, the purpose of this study was to examine the impact of entrepreneurship and multinational corporation presence on the change …

The Gender Gap In Immigrant Entrepreneurship: The Role Of Culture And Home Country Self-Employment, Amy Ingram

CMC Senior Theses

This paper investigates the effect of culture and home country self-employment rates on immigrant self-employment in the United States, post-migration. This study analyzes the effects for both men and women, focusing on the gender gap in self-employment. The empirical results show that home country effects have a small impact on self-employment, but most of this relationship is unexplained. Because the explanatory power of home country effects is so low, it is unlikely that culture significantly influences self-employment. I find that, contrary to my hypotheses, women from countries with high female self-employment rates are likely to see a larger decrease in …

The Fear Factor: Determinants Of Entrepreneurial Fear Of Failure, Pema Donyo

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis aims to investigate determinants of fear of failure in entrepreneurial activity that could inhibit starting a business. The study uses cross-sectional, pooled OLS, and panel regressions. The dependent variable is fear of failure regarding entrepreneurship, measured with the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) survey question of whether fear of failure would prevent the responder from starting a firm. The unit of analysis is at country level. I categorize determinants into demographic, property rights, and procedural variables. A population of higher working age ratio (measured as the population aged 15-64 divided by the population aged 65 and over) correlates with …

"My Friends, They Are People To Rely On": The Social Foundation Of Business In Ghana, Patrick D. Shulist

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The management and entrepreneurship literatures increasingly engage in poverty alleviation research in the developing world. However, there is a marked tendency to overlook how the Western World, from where most theory comes, differs from the developing world. Such a fallacy has potential deleterious effects on the research itself, but more importantly on the practical applications of that research.

With this in mind, my dissertation uses an inductive qualitative methodology to explore the nature of self-employment in the developing world as it is; that is, not coloured by theoretical priors. In doing this, I lay the groundwork for understanding the …

A Complement, Not A Competitor: How Public Markets Can Support Business Districts In Worcester, Ron M. Barron

International Development, Community and Environment (IDCE)

The purpose of this paper is to examine the possible economic and community development impacts of entry-level public markets (e.g. fixed location markets, farmers markets, etc.) on the communities in which they operate. While there is extensive literature around their benefits to vendors, community health and public space, there is comparative little on the interplay between these markets and more traditional brick and mortar businesses. The background and definition of these markets, the basic common characteristics that define them, and some of the benefits they can offer for economic and community development are each explored. It then examines two different …

Trashé Designs: A Social Enterprise, Cara Walden

MA IDS Thesis Projects

During my years in graduate school, my understanding of economic inequality has further expanded. While my experience in the Peace Corps and Nepal allowed me to see it in real life, my time in school has allowed me to ground these experiences in academic literature. By means of an action research project, my goal is to create economic opportunity for the HIV/AIDS community in Chiang Mai, Thailand, through the creation of the social enterprise Trashé Designs. A social enterprise is a way to address a social challenge with a market-based solution. My social enterprise, Trashé Designs, uses recycled materials to …

The Relevance Of Economic, Institutional And Cultural Determinants For Venture Capital Investments. A Us-Europe Comparison., Nadja Benes

Master's Theses

This study analyzes the determinants of early-stage VC investments by identifying characteristics in the economic, institutional, as well as cultural framework that could explain the diverging levels of early-stage VC investments across countries. Data was assembled for 16 countries during the period from 1995 until 2013. The results indicate that countries that are more open to trade are associated with higher levels in early-stage venture capital. A higher unemployment rate negatively affects a country’s level of early-stage VC funds. Higher R&D expenditures as a proxy for the technological and innovation capacity in a country as well as a higher value …

Portfolio Company Selection Criteria: Accelerators Vs Venture Capitalists, Cody Chang

CMC Senior Theses

The explosive growth of ‘accelerators’ in the United States has given entrepreneurs and their startups the opportunity to pursue seed-stage financing. While the specific economic role of accelerators remains unclear, a study comparing the selection of portfolio companies between accelerators and venture capitalists was performed. A difference of means was performed on the responses per question between the collected 19 accelerators’ response and the 100 venture capitalists’ response, recorded from a prior study. It is found that venture capitalists place significantly more weight, than accelerators, on the potential of the startup’s product or service to be proprietary, to enter a …

Ties That Bind: A Network Perspective On University Spinouts, Patrick Mchugh

2013

Research universities execute technology transfer initiatives to transition university inventions to marketplace innovations. This process requires ties to bridge the gap between two disparate networks: a university's research community and a licensing corporate entity. One type of licensing corporate entity, and the focus of this research, is a newly formed university spinout. Utilizing a network lens, this study focuses on the ties between university inventors and spinout licensees and on the impact of various inter-organizational relationships on a spinout's success. This thesis investigates the following research questions: 1. How, if at all, does variation in the nature of the tie …