Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance?
We explore whether entrepreneurial performance is due to innate talent or the accumulation of entrepreneurial experience. Using a novel data set with multiple observations of founding attempts per individual, we generate a unique measure of entrepreneurial talent. In contrast to prior findings, the...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en_US |
| Published: |
John Wiley & Sons, Inc
2014
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/88058 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0435-6525 |
| _version_ | 1826212020278525952 |
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| author | Eesley, Charles E. Roberts, Edward B. |
| author2 | Sloan School of Management |
| author_facet | Sloan School of Management Eesley, Charles E. Roberts, Edward B. |
| author_sort | Eesley, Charles E. |
| collection | MIT |
| description | We explore whether entrepreneurial performance is due to innate talent or the accumulation of entrepreneurial experience. Using a novel data set with multiple observations of founding attempts per individual, we generate a unique measure of entrepreneurial talent. In contrast to prior findings, the relative importance of experience versus talent changes with the context. When the current market or technology is familiar, experience dominates. However, when the venture context is unfamiliar, talent is more important. Individuals with experience and talent handle both familiar and unfamiliar aspects and may extract more from a given level of experience. The findings advance our understanding of how the drivers of venture performance shift with the broader technological and industry environment and places limits on when experience aids performance. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T15:14:54Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/88058 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | en_US |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T15:14:54Z |
| publishDate | 2014 |
| publisher | John Wiley & Sons, Inc |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/880582022-09-29T13:37:48Z Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance? Eesley, Charles E. Roberts, Edward B. Sloan School of Management Roberts, Edward B. We explore whether entrepreneurial performance is due to innate talent or the accumulation of entrepreneurial experience. Using a novel data set with multiple observations of founding attempts per individual, we generate a unique measure of entrepreneurial talent. In contrast to prior findings, the relative importance of experience versus talent changes with the context. When the current market or technology is familiar, experience dominates. However, when the venture context is unfamiliar, talent is more important. Individuals with experience and talent handle both familiar and unfamiliar aspects and may extract more from a given level of experience. The findings advance our understanding of how the drivers of venture performance shift with the broader technological and industry environment and places limits on when experience aids performance. MIT Entrepreneurship Center Stanford University. Stanford Technology Ventures Program Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation 2014-06-23T15:07:52Z 2014-06-23T15:07:52Z 2012-09 Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 19324391 http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/88058 Eesley, Charles E., and Edward B. Roberts. “Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent Versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance?” Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal 6, no. 3 (September 2012): 207–219. https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0435-6525 en_US http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/sej.1141 Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ application/pdf John Wiley & Sons, Inc SSRN |
| spellingShingle | Eesley, Charles E. Roberts, Edward B. Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance? |
| title | Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance? |
| title_full | Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance? |
| title_fullStr | Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance? |
| title_full_unstemmed | Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance? |
| title_short | Are You Experienced or Are You Talented?: When Does Innate Talent versus Experience Explain Entrepreneurial Performance? |
| title_sort | are you experienced or are you talented when does innate talent versus experience explain entrepreneurial performance |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/88058 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0435-6525 |
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