TY  - JOUR
A1  - Caliendo, Marco
A1  - Goethner, Maximilian
A1  - Weißenberger, Martin
T1  - Entrepreneurial persistence beyond survival: Measurement and determinants
JF  - Journal of Small Business Management
N2  - Entrepreneurial persistence is demonstrated by an entrepreneur’s continued positive maintenance of entrepreneurial motivation and constantly renewed active engagement in a new business venture despite counterforces or enticing alternatives. It thus is a crucial factor for entrepreneurs when pursuing and exploiting their business opportunities and in realizing potential economic gains and benefits. Using rich data on a representative sample of German business founders, we investigated the determinants of entrepreneurial persistence. Next to observed survival, we also constructed a hybrid persistence measure capturing the motivational dimension of persistence. We analyzed the influence of individual-level (human capital and personality) and business-related characteristics on both measures as well as their relative importance. We found that the two indicators emphasize different aspects of persistence. For the survival indicator, the predictive power was concentrated in business characteristics and human capital, while for hybrid persistence the dominant factors were business characteristics and personality. Finally, we showed that results were heterogeneous across subgroups. In particular, formerly unemployed founders did not differ in survival chances, but they were more likely to lack a high psychological commitment to their business ventures.
KW  - entrepreneurship
KW  - startups
KW  - persistence
KW  - survival
Y1  - 2019
VL  - 58
IS  - 3
PB  - Taylor & Francis
CY  - London
ER  -