TY - JOUR
T1 - Do the Prevalent Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Factors Drive the Choice of Business Models? A Mixed-methods Study Involving Social Entrepreneurs in India
AU - Nidhish, H.
AU - Ramaprasad, Badrinarayan Srirangam
AU - Sankaran, K.
AU - Prabhu, K. P.Nandan
AU - Phadke, Ravi
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 International Management Institute, New Delhi.
PY - 2024
Y1 - 2024
N2 - While social entrepreneurship scholars in the past have focused much on the building blocks of robust social entrepreneurship business models and sustainability factors including supportive ecosystem elements, it is not clear ‘what’ categories of the interactive ecosystem in which social entrepreneurs are located influence the choice of business models even before they operationalize their social ventures. Accordingly, this study espouses a mixed-method research design to address this issue. The authors collected data from 24 and 112 social entrepreneurs in two study phases, respectively. Four support factors—business, market, financial and policy were considered important by social entrepreneurs in India that they believe influenced their choice of business models. While policy and financial support factors were considered most important by social entrepreneurs with a pure social mission/impact orientation, market and business support were considered significant influential factors by social entrepreneurs with a profit orientation. Social entrepreneurs who sought a balance between social and economic missions, however, considered the presence of financial and market support to be crucial for choosing a relevant business model. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that investigates the inherent priori influence of prevalent ecosystem factors on social business model selection. It uniquely brings out an empirical association between ecosystem factors and business model preferences, affirming that factors pivotal to choice also underpin sustainability. Moreover, this study also unveils an interactive framework encompassing entrepreneur traits and their orientations, ecosystem factors, feedback and performance. Offering multiple actionable implications, this study offers key insights for policy decision-makers and practitioners.
AB - While social entrepreneurship scholars in the past have focused much on the building blocks of robust social entrepreneurship business models and sustainability factors including supportive ecosystem elements, it is not clear ‘what’ categories of the interactive ecosystem in which social entrepreneurs are located influence the choice of business models even before they operationalize their social ventures. Accordingly, this study espouses a mixed-method research design to address this issue. The authors collected data from 24 and 112 social entrepreneurs in two study phases, respectively. Four support factors—business, market, financial and policy were considered important by social entrepreneurs in India that they believe influenced their choice of business models. While policy and financial support factors were considered most important by social entrepreneurs with a pure social mission/impact orientation, market and business support were considered significant influential factors by social entrepreneurs with a profit orientation. Social entrepreneurs who sought a balance between social and economic missions, however, considered the presence of financial and market support to be crucial for choosing a relevant business model. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that investigates the inherent priori influence of prevalent ecosystem factors on social business model selection. It uniquely brings out an empirical association between ecosystem factors and business model preferences, affirming that factors pivotal to choice also underpin sustainability. Moreover, this study also unveils an interactive framework encompassing entrepreneur traits and their orientations, ecosystem factors, feedback and performance. Offering multiple actionable implications, this study offers key insights for policy decision-makers and practitioners.
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U2 - 10.1177/09721509241237597
DO - 10.1177/09721509241237597
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85188349172
SN - 0972-1509
JO - Global Business Review
JF - Global Business Review
ER -