Purpose The recognition of opportunities for sustainable development is considered to be an essential part of sustainable entrepreneurship, but studies that address this phenomenon are scarce. A conceptual model which aims to explain the factors that lead to the recognition of sustainable opportunities was proposed by Patzelt and Shepherd (2011), but published research that tests this model empirically is limited. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the sustainable entrepreneurship literature by empirically exploring Patzelt and Shepherd’s conceptual model in order to shed light on how sustainable entrepreneurs recognize opportunities for sustainable businesses in practice. Design/methodology/approach This paper adopts a qualitative research approach to address the aims of the study. In-depth semi-structured interviews were carried out with eight sustainable entrepreneurs based in Berlin. The data were analyzed by means of thematic analysis. Findings The findings indicate that sustainable entrepreneurs are influenced in their identification of sustainable opportunities by their knowledge of natural and communal environments, by their motivation to develop gains for themselves and others, and by entrepreneurial knowledge. These findings largely support the model proposed by Patzelt and Shepherd (2011). Furthermore, they extend this model by shedding light on some of the factors that comprise its components, as this study found that spending time abroad and socialization enhance entrepreneurs’ knowledge of natural and communal environments; a desire to be self-employed, aspects of one’s personality and one’s personal circumstances are sources of motivation, while prior jobs and prior projects create entrepreneurial knowledge. Originality/value Only two other studies have empirically tested Patzelt and Shepherd’s (2011) model, and these have led to disparate results. The first was conducted by Choongo et al. (2016), who did not find any evidence to support this model. The second was carried out by Muñoz and Dimov (2017), who addressed the model partially. This paper therefore makes four major contributions. First, it is the first to offer preliminary empirical support for each component of Patzelt and Shepherd’s (2011) conceptual model. Second, it extends their model by identifying some of the factors comprising its components. Third, it reflects on possible reasons why extant research has led to disparate findings. Fourth, it proposes avenues of research to resolve the unanswered questions arising from these studies. This paper therefore makes a contribution to the literature on sustainable entrepreneurship and serves as a stepping stone for further theory development and empirical research on sustainable opportunity recognition.

This is the accepted version of the paper.This version of the publication may differ from the final published version. Intuition is a way of processing information that is largely unconscious, associative, fast, and contextually dependent. As part of the growing cognition-oriented research agenda in the entrepreneurship field, the specific cognitive construct of intuition has attracted relatively little attention. We find this position surprising, particularly since some entrepreneurship scholars have described intuition as the seed of entrepreneurial activity. In this review, we examine the small but rapidly growing literature at the intersection of intuition and entrepreneurship. In critically analyzing this body of work, we reveal a number of areas that warrant further attention if scholars wish to enhance academic understanding of the role of intuition in the entrepreneurial process. From our review, we develop an agenda to help guide scholars of entrepreneurial cognition with a specific interest in intuition in their future research. In doing so, we address a gap in the entrepreneurial cognition literature which currently lacks a clear view of the value of entrepreneurship research on intuition and of how it should be conducted. Permanent repository link3 Entrepreneurship Research on Intuition: A Critical Analysis and Research AgendaIntuitions are "affectively charged judgments that arise through rapid, non-conscious, and holistic associations" (Dane and Pratt, 2007, p. 40). Although some scholars claim that intuition is "the seed of any entrepreneurial action" (Dutta and Crossan, 2005, p. 436), there has been limited attention devoted to studying the role of intuition in the entrepreneurial process. This might be partly due to the non-conscious nature of intuition, which makes it difficult for entrepreneurs to reliably report their use of intuition. As Blume and Covin (2011) remarked, "if intuition is appropriately conceived of as a subconscious reasoning process, how can we consciously 'know' that intuition was involved as a decision driver?" (p. 139).Despite its somewhat elusive nature, intuition has captured the interest of a growing number of scholars. Our systematic review of the literature revealed 25 publications related to entrepreneurs' use of intuition, half of which were published since 2008. This is indicative of a promising and emerging research area. However prior reviews and our own analyses revealed that entrepreneurship research on intuition is not located in one single field of research, but is fragmented across entrepreneurship, general management, organization studies and psychology journals. Furthermore, scholars have explored a large number of research questions, relied on contradictory theories of information processing (i.e., unitary versus dual-process views), and deployed a wide range of techniques to measure intuition (e.g., preference for intuition versus actual use of intuition). The dispersion of publications in cognate yet distinct fields, together with the diversity of resea...

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As many high-profile business leaders purport to make decisions based on gut feelings, a growing number of management scholars are seeking to explain how leaders use intuition in organizational settings. In line with dual-process theories, management scholars argue that the most effective decision makers are cognitively versatile, which means that they are able to 'switch cognitive gears' between intuition and analysis and, more importantly, that they are able to use both types of processing at high levels. Although this has important implications, the actual use of intuition as well as cognitive versatility have received limited scholarly attention. Motivated by the desire to address this gap, we pose the following research question: To what extent is experience associated with a) intuition and b) cognitive versatility, and with what effects? We consider the influence of domain-specific experience because this is considered to be a prerequisite for intuition, and we explore the effects in the context of new venture ideation which is a precursor to and the lifeblood of entrepreneurial action, not only for founders of new ventures but also for managers of existing organizations who seek to drive innovation and be entrepreneurial. We build on insights from the dual-process Cognitive-Experiential Self-Theory, as well as the literature on managerial and entrepreneurial intuition, to develop a conceptual model, which we test on data collected from 74 technology-entrepreneurs via think-aloud protocol analysis and an online survey. We find that experienced entrepreneurs are able to use both intuition and analysis extensively during new venture ideation, and that the use of intuition is most effective for new venture ideation when used together with analysis -both at high levels -in a cognitively versatile strategy.