Entrepreneurial decision-making logics during time-critical pivoting: empirical evidence from high-tech ventures

Entrepreneurs typically adopt decision-making logics such as effectuation, causation or a hybrid during venture creation and development. One part of such development involves the search for viable business models. Ventures might need to deviate from their initial plan and radically change (i.e., pivot). While entrepreneurial decision-making logics at venture creation have received substantial research attention, we know little about their dynamics during pivoting. Specifically, pivoting is often accompanied by time and resource constraints for entrepreneurs and such constraints can influence entrepreneurial decision-making. This inductive and multiple case study is based on 14 ventures in Europe's DACH region. It explores the question of how and why time constraints and perceived time pressures affect entrepreneurs' decision-making logics during pivoting processes. Findings suggest that entrepreneurs tend to employ more effectual logics when time constraints and perceived time pressures are pronounced and vice versa for causal logics. The emerging findings contribute to entrepreneurship and effectuation theory in that they indicate that time plays a crucial role for pivoting entrepreneurs' decision-making logics.