This article describes the benefits and pitfalls of starting a firm with an entrepreneurial team, drawing on a longitudinal empirical analysis of the life course of 90 team start-ups and 1196 solo start-ups in the Netherlands. In the first three years of their existence, team start-ups perform...

Why does one person actually succeed in starting a business, while a second gives up, and a third is still trying? To answer this question, a longitudinal study was set up in which 330 nascent entrepreneurs (people setting up a business) were followed over a one-year period. After one year, 47%...

Female and male entrepreneurs differ in the way they finance their businesses. This can be attributed to the type of business and the type of management and experience (indirect effect). Female start-ups may also experience other barriers based upon discriminatory effects (direct effect)....

This paper deals with differences in the rate of self-employment (business ownership) in 15 European countries for the period 1978-2000, focusing on the influence of dissatisfaction and using the framework of occupational choice. Using two different measures of dissatisfaction, in addition to...

Analyzing a cross-country panel of 16 OECD countries from 2002 to 2005, we find that higher unemployment benefits crowd out nascent entrepreneurial activity. Our results hold regardless of entrepreneurial motivation (necessity or opportunity) and entrepreneurial type (imitative or innovative).

We study a unique sample of 1,547 nascent entrepreneurs in Germany and analyze which factors are associated with their start-up satisfaction. Our results identify a group of nascent entrepreneurs that “cannot get satisfaction†with their start-up because they did not choose to become...

Social networks matter in the innovation processes of young and small firms, since ‘innovation does not exist in a vacuum (Van De Ven, 1986: 601).’ The contacts a firm has could both generate advantages for further innovation and growth, and disadvantages leading to inertia and...

This paper investigates the commitment-orientation of HRM practices in female- and male-led firms. A distinction is made between emphasizing commitment or control in the design of HRM practices. To test for gender differences use is made of a sample of 555 Dutch firms. Contrary to what is...