Effectual entrepreneurial expertise: existence and bounds

Abstract

Recent theorizing in entrepreneurship has proposed effectuation as a baseline model of entrepreneurial expertise that goes beyond the “toolbox” of basic business skills such as market research and business planning. This study seeks to empirically delineate key elements of entrepreneurial expertise as compared with basic business knowledge. Think aloud protocols were extracted from 27 expert entrepreneurs and 37 MBA students who were asked to identify the market for a single new product. Analyses revealed that 89% of experts used effectuation more frequently than causation, while MBA students demonstrated a noticeably opposing preference, with 81% using causation more than effectuation.