Letting go to grow : empirical findings on a hearsay

Research to date has largely neglected the role of management style in new entrepreneurial ventures. We address this gap by investigating the impact of management style on company performance and how the impact is different contingent on the life cycle stage of new entrepreneurial ventures. By employing the concept of microinvolvement, our study demonstrates that management style significantly impacts company performance and that the merits of a highly involved management style are less in later-stage new entrepreneurial ventures. This finding provides support for the saying "letting go to grow" and raises important implications for management.