Entrepreneurial Practices and Management Strategies: A Review

Abstract

The highly uncertain and dynamic economic situation coupled with a competitive global environment creates both new threats and new opportunities, forcing entrepreneurs to become more and more strategic in their management approaches. This is becoming important for both new as well as established enterprises to compete and survive. Entrepreneurs are therefore forced to look at the identification of strategic opportunities and converting them into competitive advantages and better organizational performances. However, by its very nature, true entrepreneurship is not constrained by strategies or principles of management, and entrepreneurs are required to innovate and change continuously as they progress on their path of creating and exploiting opportunities and fulfilling customer and market expectations. They are thus driven more by the need to adapt, adopt and succeed. However, an established or realized venture needs to be more management and strategy oriented so as to be able to sustain, survive and succeed in the long run. There is thus a dichotomy in the approaches between entrepreneurship and management. Also, while both entrepreneurship and strategic management are focused on creating value for the customer, entrepreneurs need to identify and create opportunities to exploit the resources; and strategists need to allocate and use the resources (optimally) in order to exploit the opportunities for sustainable competitive advantage. Entrepreneurial actions and strategic actions can contribute to value creation independently, but they can contribute even more when they are integrated. This paper explores the areas of intersection between entrepreneurship practices and strategic management by reviewing the extant literature on the subject and benefit both management strategists and entrepreneurs.