Revitalizing Entrepreneurship: How Visual Symbols are Used in Entrepreneurial Performances

Abstract

To gain and sustain support for novel ventures, entrepreneurs must use symbolic means to signal to resource providers that their venture is feasible and legitimate. Previous research has generally focused on how entrepreneurs use language to symbolically represent their ventures as compatible with more widely established sets of activities. This paper suggests that entrepreneurs' use of visual symbols also plays a direct role in achieving support for a venture. Based upon a visual ethnographic study of three entrepreneurs, this paper demonstrates how entrepreneurs use visual symbols to: present an appropriate scene to stakeholders; create professional identity and emphasize control; and regulate emotions. The types of visual symbols used by the entrepreneurs are: setting, props, dress, and expressiveness. Overall, the results suggest that more experienced entrepreneurs are more effective at using a wider range of visual symbols during interactions.

Balancing “what matters to me” with “what matters to them”: Exploring the legitimation process of environmental entrepreneurs

“…These goals must be enacted within constraints (Rindova et al, 2009), such as the need to gain legitimacy. New ventures need to gain legitimacy in order to engage stakeholders (Clarke, 2011), attract resources, and in turn, improve the prospects of survival and longer-term success (Aldrich and Fiol, 1994;Tornikoski and Newbert, 2007;Zimmerman and Zeitz, 2002).…”

“…Garud et al, 2014;Lounsbury and Glynn, 2001;Navis and Glynn, 2011;Ruebottom, 2013), use a variety of different types of arguments (van Wervan et al, 2015) and/ or use visual symbols (e.g. setting, props, dress and expressiveness) (Clarke, 2011) as they actively negotiate legitimacy with their audiences.…”

“…Voronov et al, 2013), and legitimation activity by entrepreneurs (e.g. Clarke, 2011;Ruebottom, 2013;Zott and Huy, 2007).…”

Charting new territory for organizational ethnography

“…In those instances, multiinstrument ethnographies that afford a technologically mediated presence, such as in virtual ethnographies are without alternative. (Clarke, 2011;Heath & Hindmarsh, 2002;LeBaron, 2008).…”

“…Alternatively, video ethnographies can foreground those socio-material environments that have recently come to fascinate organizational scholars (Orlikowski, 2007), zoom in on verbal, material, spatial, symbolic and bodily cues, and ask new questions about how their interactions shape organizational practice (e.g., Clarke, 2011;Streeck et al, 2011).…”