In the pursuit of social business venture: an empirical study

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this dissertation is to clarify two separate objectives: (1) We develop a cognitive-affect model of social entrepreneurship that begins with empathy (i.e. perspective taking and empathic concern) and progresses through prosocial behavior to social entrepreneurship intention. We further conduct two contingencies – namely entrepreneurial opportunity evaluation and exploitation - that moderate the proposed relationships (paper 1). (2) We propose two mechanisms as to how perceived entrepreneurial passion of employees impact on their creativity. The first mechanism involves the mediating role of creative process engagement in the perceived passion-creativity linkage. The second one, we focus on the moderating role of mindfulness in the mediating pathway (paper 2). Design/methodology/approach – This dissertation consists of two separate surveys on social entrepreneurship in Vietnam. (1) Our sampling frame includes would-be entrepreneurs. We utilize variance-based SEM to examine the psychometric properties of focal constructs. We also use Baron and Kenny (1986), SPSS macro PROCESS to test the proposed hypothesis. (2) The dyads of employees and supervisors or founders of social venture are sampled to fill out our survey. The empirical findings rely on Partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM). Findings and contributions (1) For the first study: First, our findings highlight the significance of including both cognitive and emotional aspects of empathy (i.e., perspective taking and empathic concern respectively) in prosocial decision making in social entrepreneurship context. Secondly, our findings enrich existing theory and research by highlighting the essential role of prosocial behavior as a modus operandi through which perspective taking and empathic concern are linked to social entrepreneurship intention. Lastly, our study is the first to broaden the focus of empathy in social entrepreneurship research. (2) For the second study: First, our study extends the literature by demonstrating that entrepreneurial passion influences employee creativity via creative process engagement. Secondly, our study confirms with prior studies that have empirically demonstrated the efficacy of mindfulness to improve employee creativity. Practical implications (1) For the first study: First, our findings recommend that the ability to sense others’ thoughts and feeling are of paramount importance in identifying and supporting promising social entrepreneurs. Secondly, managers’ understanding of how prosocial behavior intervenes the relationship between empathy and social entrepreneurial intention suggests that prosocial behavior can be broadened and deepened by appropriate training programs. Lastly, managers should also note that opportunity contingencies shape the impact of prosocial behavior on social entrepreneurial intention by accentuating the role of opportunity evaluation and opportunity exploitation. (2) For the second study: Firstly, our study suggests that employees with high entrepreneurial passion are more likely to get engaged on the creative process and subsequently, produce more novel and useful ideas. Secondly, employees are more familiar and are more interested to the activities related to inventing and developing as those activities are related to their current occupation than founding. Third, our study provides a more specific guideline for management in adopting mindfulness and entrepreneurial passion within the company, especially to improve creativity. Research limitations (1) For the first study: First, we cannot make conclusions on the causal order of the observed relationships because of the cross-sectional nature of the study. The second concerns the limited scope of this study, which focuses on undergraduate and postgraduate students, thus limiting the generalizability of the findings. Third, future research could enhance our understanding of the indirect effect of empathy by examining other types of employee attitudes and behaviors. (2) For the second study: First, the context of this study is limited to social ventures in Vietnam. Second and also related to the context, the sample of this study only involves social ventures which have a distinct characteristics compare to the general commercial venture. Lastly, future studies should examine various positive emotions within the job context and examine their relationship with creativity.