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Attributes of legitimate venture failure impressions

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  • Kibler, Ewald
  • Mandl, Christoph
  • Kautonen, Teemu
  • Berger, Elisabeth S.C.

Abstract

The current research investigates the effectiveness of impression management strategies available to entrepreneurs to foster social legitimacy with stakeholders following venture failure. We use a conjoint experiment to examine how different attributions of causes of failure influence the general public's legitimacy judgments. The most effective strategy proves to be the entrepreneurs distancing themselves from the failure, in that they attribute the failure to external factors that are not under the entrepreneurs' volitional control, and brought about by circumstances that are unlikely to reoccur. Our analysis also considers how the audience members' dispositional agreeableness and general self-efficacy influence judgment formation.

Suggested Citation

  • Kibler, Ewald & Mandl, Christoph & Kautonen, Teemu & Berger, Elisabeth S.C., 2017. "Attributes of legitimate venture failure impressions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 145-161.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbvent:v:32:y:2017:i:2:p:145-161
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2017.01.003
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    3. Song Lin & Yasuhiro Yamakawa & Jing Li, 2019. "Emergent learning and change in strategy: empirical study of Chinese serial entrepreneurs with failure experience," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 773-792, September.
    4. Fisch, Christian & Block, Jörn H., 2021. "How does entrepreneurial failure change an entrepreneur's digital identity? Evidence from Twitter data," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 36(1).
    5. Sonia S. Siraz & Björn Claes & Julio O. De Castro & Eero Vaara, 2023. "Theorizing the Grey Area between Legitimacy and Illegitimacy," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(4), pages 924-962, June.
    6. Jose L. Salmeron & Taha Mansouri & Mohammad Reza Sadeghi Moghaddam & Narjes Yousefi & Alireza Tayebi, 2023. "Startup’s critical failure factors dynamic modeling using FCM," Journal of Global Entrepreneurship Research, Springer;UNESCO Chair in Entrepreneurship, vol. 13(1), pages 1-18, December.
    7. Santos, Susana C. & Caetano, António & Brochado, Ana, 2023. "Why am I so successful? Self-presentation and deliberative attributions of success in entrepreneurship," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 19(C).
    8. Pankaj C. Patel & Mike G. Tsionas & Maria João Guedes, 2022. "Benford's law, small business financial reporting, and survival," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(8), pages 3301-3315, December.
    9. Kibler, Ewald & Salmivaara, Virva & Stenholm, Pekka & Terjesen, Siri, 2018. "The evaluative legitimacy of social entrepreneurship in capitalist welfare systems," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 53(6), pages 944-957.
    10. Castelló, Itziar & Barberá-Tomás, David & Vaara, Eero, 2023. "Moving on: Narrative identity reconstruction after entrepreneurial failure," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 38(4).
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