Perceptions of entrepreneurs among polish students

The aim of this paper is to present how we can approach and explore the field of entrepreneurship phenomenon in an alternative way. We do this by employing constructivist philosophical position than is gaining more acceptance in business and management research. We hope to outline how we can approach topic of entrepreneurship using alternative, not mainstream method, This is done with the use of visual data gathered among Gdansk University of Technology among students who were asked to present their constructions of an entrepreneur. The data presented here is part of a wider research project, focused on semiotics of symbols present in the pictorial representations of entrepreneurs. When an individual is being described as ‘entrepreneurial’ or ‘enterprising’ this is usually taken as a compliment. Nevertheless, these words have different meanings for different people. One of the first academics who encompassed the negative notions of being enterprising in the field of entrepreneurship was Baumol (1990) who analyzed perceptions of entrepreneurs from historical perspective. He has distinguished three types of entrepreneurship: productive, unproductive and destructive. The alternative understandings and meanings of entrepreneurship have recently emerged in the field of entrepreneurship, especially the ones situated in the interpretative paradigm. They have been explained and explored under the theme of ‘entrepreneurship beyond the boundaries’ .