Is business planning useful for the new venture emergence?

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to build a research model to examine the effects of business planning on the new venture emergence, as well as to examine the moderating effects of innovativeness of products. Design/methodology/approach: Four hypotheses are put forward and examined by hierarchical binary logistic regression. The data of this paper are based on the first two waves of data from Chinese Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics project. Findings: Results show that engaging in business planning has a positive effect on the new venture emergence, and the timing of business planning does not affect the new venture emergence significantly. This study also finds that the innovativeness of products has a positive moderating effect on the relationship between the timing of business planning and the new venture emergence. Research limitations/implications: This study has some limitations. The innovativeness of products is measured by a single indicator, which may not completely reflect the meaning of the attribute. Moreover, this study explores new ventures only in the nascent stage. Practical implications: The study is useful for entrepreneurs to realize the importance of business planning. First, engaging in business planning in early start-up stage is a very valuable activity, because business planning can help new ventures reduce the loss caused by trial and error learning. Second, engaging in business planning is more likely to ensure high innovative products quickly be accepted by the market. Because in the process of new venture emergence, the legitimacy signal to stakeholders can be transmitted and new products can be promoted to get support and recognition from stakeholder through the business plan. Originality/value: This paper focuses on the early stage of new venture life cycle and the contextual factors to explore the influence of business planning on the new venture emergence under the logic of legitimacy. This paper could enrich business planning research from the perspective of legitimacy theory by inspiring scholars to focus on the differences between new ventures and mature enterprises and to offer proposals of legitimation strategies suitable for new ventures. Meanwhile, this study contributes to the understanding of the contextual factors of business planning. And it discusses the impact of the attribute in business planning on the new venture emergence, which helps scholars to get a deep thought about the value of business planning in entrepreneurial process.