Supporting entrepreneurship in high cost economies: What can governments do?

Abstract

This chapter sets out the findings of a comprehensive literature review that addressed three objectives: to review internationally recognised and accepted methodologies of entrepreneurial human and firm characteristics data collection and analysis; to formulate the contemporary view and latest research on entrepreneurial characteristics and how these characteristics contribute to a model of entrepreneurial firm behaviour; to examine developments in the literature that explain to what extent human characteristics influence and predict the performance of firms. The implications of this work are that firms with high potential in either innovation or market-based growth opportunities need to have the right environmental settings in terms of social, political, regulatory, economics, and technology for firms with a high success potential to realise this potential. The concept of stage progression and the relationship between the characteristics of the individual, the firm, and the opportunity provide the elements of a framework through which to consider government support programs and interventions.