Effectual entrepreneurial expertise: existence and bounds
Author
Sarasvathy, Saras D.
Dew, Nicholas
Read, Stuart
Wiltbank, Robert
Date
2007Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
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.