Entrepreneurship as a Calling: A Pilot Study with Aspiring Entrepreneurs

Abstract

Previous research in work and organisational studies has found that individuals may experience their work as a job, a career or a calling. That experience, in turn, has a significant influence on their performance. In the present study, we apply this framework to the field of entrepreneurship and examine if the experience of aspiring entrepreneurs as a job, a career or a calling impacts their ability to attract resources for a new venture by considering two different resource attraction strategies presented in the literature: network positioning and proactive search. The results show that seeing entrepreneurship as a job has a negative impact on both network positioning and proactive search strategies. Experiencing entrepreneurship as a calling, however, has a positive impact on proactive search strategy. Perceiving entrepreneurship as a career is not related to resource attraction strategies. These findings illustrate that the way aspiring entrepreneurs experience their role as entrepreneurs affects their efforts as well as others’ confidence in terms of attracting resources for their new ventures. Theoretical and practical implications are addressed at the end of this work.