Bringing the entrepreneurial voice to the fore in entrepreneurial ecosystems

Abstract

Recent entrepreneurial ecosystems literature has helped push general entrepreneurship research away from the idea of the entrepreneur as a lone Schumpeterian hero figure and advanced a view of entrepreneurship as a social process connected to a local context. However, that same literature often portrays entrepreneurs as objects—individuals who are acted upon through support from public-sector experts. In this study of a regional entrepreneurial ecosystem, we argue that the voice of the entrepreneur as an active subject is largely absent from existing literature. We argue that in terms of building entrepreneurial ecosystems, both practitioners and the research community should pay more attention to the diversity of the entrepreneurial voice. We identify five very different entrepreneurial voices that bring diversity to the dominant narrative of the entrepreneurial ecosystem as a melting pot for new technology and high-growth start-ups. In addition, we suggest further study of how entrepreneurial ecosystems acquire legitimacy in the eyes of the entrepreneurs and how this legitimacy should be built, orchestrated, or managed. Furthermore, we discuss the implications of entrepreneurial voice for research, policy, and practice related to entrepreneurial ecosystem building.