Perceptions of government actions and entrepreneurship performance

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to define the way of influence of national culture on the performance of entrepreneurship. As a possible channel of this influence, the perceptions of public policy by entrepreneurs have been analysed. Design/methodology/approach The data were collected from a survey conducted in 2014-2015, which consist of 207 surveyed entrepreneurs from Slovakia and 197 from Ukraine. The author analyses the perception of government policy in the field of entrepreneurship, institutional and personal trust and personal characteristics of respondents. Findings The main finding is that the coherence of formal and informal institutions in the representations of entrepreneurs affects the performance of their business. Perceptions of government actions seems to be endogenous to unobservable national culture. Entrepreneurs’ trust was found to be important in countries with different institutional environment. Practical implications Based on these findings, it would be possible to improve the stimulation of government policies for business by taking into account the most important types of policies for business performance in the definite institutional environment. Originality/value This is the first study in examining the exact mechanisms of the national culture’s influence on business development through entrepreneurs’ perceptions.