ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN A LIFE COURSE PERSPECTIVE
Lene Foss, Norwegian Institute of Fisheries an Aquaculture Ltd.
Principal Topic
The research problem is formulated as three questions:1) Does the life course put different constraints on female and male entrepreneurs’ start-up? 2) Do female and male entrepreneurs vary in how they build and expand their personal network? 3) Do female and male entrepreneurs “convert” their general and specific human capital differently in the process of start-up and running a firm?
Method
A research design with exploratory and descriptive elements was utilized to uncover the entrepreneurs’ rationale and to obtain a structured description of their life course, human capital, social network and business start-up. Entrepreneurs chosen represented several industries from two regions in Norway, from both rural and urban environments. In order to cover the full aspect of life course, young, middle-aged and older entrepreneurs, differing on marital status and number of children were needed. The sample consists of people who have just started whereas others have been running their businesses for some years. Personal interviews (up to 3 hours) using a semi-structured interview guide were completed with 24 women and 16 men.
Implications
The data suggests several connections between the individuals’ family history, education and work experience and how they build relationships and expand their network. The results indicate that men and women experience the same expansion (volume and quality) in their network from the establishment process to the actual running of the firm. Replying on a question of what they value in the process of making new contacts the majority that knowing a person who is positive towards the entrepreneurs mean a lot to them. Also that the actual individual has knowledge or resources the entrepreneur needs access to or that the person knows other people who have that knowledge or type of resources. Interestingly, the fact that they already know the persons mean very little, also that the person has the same sex as the entrepreneur him or herself. This supports a hypothesis that men and women are not gender oriented in their networking, but that the positive attitude, knowledge or resources of the new contacts, or indirect contacts are considered valuable.
Formal education and work experience seem to play the same role as a personal asset that affects start-up and running of a firm. Many of the entrepreneurs come from self-employed families, or have a childhood where they learned to take responsibility for bringing up their siblings and learn how to earn money. The results support the hypothesis that entrepreneurs, female or male, seem to convert their prior human capital into the start-up and running of their business. Regarding life-course both female and male entrepreneurs state they could not have started their kind of business in earlier periods of their life. Their education or work history and the bringing up of children has been necessary to motivate them and accomplish their dream of starting a business.
CONTACT: Lene Foss, Norwegian Institute of Fisheries and Aquaculture Ltd., Centre of Economics and marketing, N-9005 Tromsų, Norway; (T)+ 47 77 62 90 00; (F)+ 47 77 62 91 00; lene.foss@fiskforsk.norut.no
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