Regenerative failure and attribution

Abstract

Purpose: This study focuses on the underlying processes that occur between entrepreneurs' primary attributions for failure and their emergent learning from the experience, in the context of regenerative failure. Approach:The research centres on twenty-one entrepreneurs operating in the Producing Services Sector, a major subsector of the Irish Information and Communication Technology (ICT) industry. All experienced business failure and subsequently re-entered the entrepreneurial sphere at a later date (i.e. regenerative failures). A qualitative approach examines entrepreneurs' attributions for failure, responses to failure, and learning dimensions from failure. Findings: Four types of failure attributions are uncovered -1) internal individuallevel; 2) external firm-level; 3) external market-level; 4) hybrid attributions. Attributions impact entrepreneurs' responses to failure and ultimately impact entrepreneurial learning. When failure is primarily attributed to internal factors, the entrepreneur's response is largely affective, leading to deep, personal learning about oneself. External attributions (both firm-and market-level) result in a predominantly behavioural response, with learning focused on the venture, networks, and relationships. Those primarily attributing failure to hybrid factors have a largely cognitive response and learn about venture management. Research Limitations: This is a retrospective analysis of business failure. Original Value: This paper contributes to the growing literature on entrepreneurs' attributions for business failure by focusing on regenerative failure; furthermore it details the link between attributions for, responses to, and learning from, failure. The key contribution to knowledge is encapsulated in the model of the underlying processes affecting learning from failure for regenerative entrepreneurs.

Entrepreneurship Resilience: Can Psychological Traits of Entrepreneurial Intention Support Overcoming Entrepreneurial Failure?

“…Many entrepreneurs who have experienced and learned from failures use this experience to start a new firm, and a better method of forming an organization helps ensure that they will use their past failures to recover (Amankwah-Amoah et al, 2016;Walsh and Cunningham, 2017). Entrepreneurs should learn to emerge from the haze of EF, recognize that the company has…”

“…Many entrepreneurs who suffer and learn from failures use their unsuccessful experiences to start up a new firm, and these findings suggest that one way for entrepreneurs to recover from previous failures is to start a new business (Amankwah-Amoah et al, 2016;Walsh and Cunningham, 2017). Entrepreneurs need to separate themselves from the emotion of EF, accept the fact that the company has failed, and avoid stigma, in order to successfully launch a new business (Walsh and Cunningham, 2017). Furthermore, entrepreneurs believe that their past failures have helped them to direct their potential business and career paths, as well as the decisions that led to them (Dias and Teixeira, 2017).…”

“…Internal individual factors can influence the EF (Yamakawa and Cardon, 2015;Walsh and Cunningham, 2017), and they can be attributed to the entrepreneur on a personal basis. In contrast, previous research has widely explored factors underlying the intention of a person to be an entrepreneur, especially psychological factors.…”

“…This may allow entrepreneurs to better take advantage of new business opportunities (Amankwah-Amoah et al, 2016). The process of launching a new venture plan is a means for an entrepreneur to recover from past failures (Amankwah-Amoah et al, 2016;Walsh and Cunningham, 2017). Moreover, launching a new venture or enterprise shows they want to continue as an entrepreneur by leveraging their experience.…”

Investigating the Causes of Entrepreneurs Failure to Start-up Greenhouse Business in Isfahan Province, Iran

“…in the failure of entrepreneurs. Walsh and Cunningham (2017) attributes the failure of entrepreneurs to inexperience, lack of financial commitment, difficulty accessing finance resources. Al-Shami et al (2019) attributes the failure of Malaysian female entrepreneurship to personal life events, intensive competition and loan inflexibility, lack of resources, poor financial management and personal dissatisfaction with their own business performance.…”