“I am apt to show off”: exploring the relationship between entrepreneurs’ narcissism and start-up innovation

Abstract

Purpose of the paper:In start-ups, innovation strategies are influenced by the entrepreneur's personality. We aim to investigate such influence by exploring how entrepreneurs' narcissism affects start-ups' innovation.Methodology: We integrated survey data on a cross-industry sample of 115 Italian entrepreneurs with secondary data consisting of patents, economic and financial information from a public database. The survey uses the NPI-16 scale to measure entrepreneurs' narcissism.Results: Results showed a non-linear relationship between entrepreneurs' narcissism and start-ups' innovation: high and low levels of narcissism are detrimental to innovation. Moreover, we found a substitution effect between market dynamism and start-ups' innovation; the higher the level of market dynamism, the more negative the effect of entrepreneurs' narcissism on innovation.Research limitations: Being based on an Italian sample, the study does not address the impact of narcissism in other cultures. Practical implications: Our study identifies the mechanisms through which entrepreneurs' narcissism affects start-ups' innovation and explores how the market scenario affects the relationship between entrepreneurs' narcissism and innovation.Originality of the paper: We show that narcissism might be positive for firms and identify how entrepreneurs' narcissism affects start-ups' innovation. We demonstrate that market scenario affects the relationship between entrepreneurs' narcissism and innovation, while also showing that contextual factors can reveal important contingencies. From a methodological viewpoint, we applied the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI) scale to a sample of entrepreneurs. Previous work mainly used secondary data consisting of business reports and interviews, or employed the NPI in samples of MBA students.

Narcissism and Entrepreneurship: A Systematic Review and an Agenda for Future Research

“…Second, we surveyed previous reviews (e.g., Frese and Gielnik, 2014;Omorede et al, 2015) and meta-analyses (e.g., Zhao and Seibert, 2006;Zhao et al, 2010) related to entrepreneurship psychology and personality to find relevant studies. We thus obtained nine additional sources, which include one conference paper (e.g., Stöckmann et al, 2015), one book chapter (e.g., Tucker et al, 2016), three discussion papers (e.g., DeNisi, 2015;Miller, 2015;Klotz and Neubaum, 2016), and four peer-reviewed articles (Leonelli et al, 2016(Leonelli et al, , 2019Tucker et al, 2017;Kraus et al, 2018).…”

“…Researchers have used social exchange theory to analyze narcissistic entrepreneurs' entrepreneurial motives and attitudes (two articles, e.g., Hmieleski and Lerner, 2016;Wu et al, 2019a). Research on the relationship between narcissism and entrepreneurial outcomes (e.g., entrepreneurial performance, success, and failure) mostly applies the upper echelons theory (UET; seven articles, e.g., Wales et al, 2013;Engelen et al, 2016;Kraus et al, 2018;Leonelli et al, 2019;Shabbir and Kousar, 2019;Bouncken et al, 2020;Yu et al, 2020). This is done to explore the impact of narcissism among entrepreneurs or senior management on corporate performance.…”

“…Moreover, this shorter scale has been widely used in the study of narcissism and entrepreneurship. Among the 23 empirical studies we retained, 7 adopted the NPI-16 to measure narcissism (e.g., Mathieu and St-Jean, 2013;Wales et al, 2013;Stöckmann et al, 2015;Kollmann et al, 2019;Leonelli et al, 2019;Liu et al, 2019;Shabbir and Kousar, 2019).…”

“…The other type of indicator measures the effect of narcissism on entrepreneurial performance by focusing on the innovation and growth of startups. For example, Leonelli et al (2019) found an inverted U-shaped relationship between entrepreneurial narcissism and startup innovation at the individual level. Moreover, this curvilinear relationship was attenuated in dynamic markets and unaffected in concentrated markets.…”

Keep dreaming: how personality traits affects the recognition and exploitation of entrepreneurial opportunities in the agritourism industry

“…Finally, sustainability orientation is the firm management's belief in the connection between environmental and societal issues. We selected these traits because narcissism and locus of control are often positively associated with entrepreneurship (Hansemark, 1998;Leonelli et al, 2019). Furthermore, the choices of narcissistic entrepreneurs are generally different from those of non-narcissistic entrepreneurs (i.e.…”