Entrepreneurial resource acquisition in startup accelerators
File(s)
Author(s)
Portz, Lisa
Type
Thesis
Abstract
This dissertation consists of three free-standing papers focused on how entrepreneurs acquire resources in an accelerator setting.
For the first two papers, I conducted an ethnographic study of a startup accelerator program. The first paper aims to answer the question of how entrepreneurs construct a legitimate narrative. Our findings suggest that the key to constructing such narrative is for founders to involve the venture’s stakeholders in the process of joint experimentation to ensure the narrative resonates with resource provider expectations.
The second paper seeks to enhance our understanding of how founders acquire resources given the ambiguity around the resources a venture needs and who can best provide them. It shows the critical role an accelerator plays in making the search and acquisition of such resources more efficient. First, they facilitate the recognition of a venture’s resource gap. Second, they bridge the ventures with the appropriate resource providers to fill the identified gaps. Finally, they help close the gaps through making the “rules of the game” more explicit and helping founders navigate informal relationships with such resource providers.
The third chapter is based on another accelerator program where I collected a dataset of 140 “Demo Day” pitches. Seeking to understand what makes pitch “strategies” successful, I used a configurational approach (fuzzy-set QCA). The results illuminate five different “pitch recipes” and suggest that men and women can have different paths to successfully securing funding.
Combined, the above three papers strengthen our understanding of how founders acquire the much-needed resources to get their venture off the ground and what role accelerator programs play in this. Each chapter includes implications for both theory and practice of entrepreneurship and is underpinned by my own entrepreneurial and accelerator experience.
For the first two papers, I conducted an ethnographic study of a startup accelerator program. The first paper aims to answer the question of how entrepreneurs construct a legitimate narrative. Our findings suggest that the key to constructing such narrative is for founders to involve the venture’s stakeholders in the process of joint experimentation to ensure the narrative resonates with resource provider expectations.
The second paper seeks to enhance our understanding of how founders acquire resources given the ambiguity around the resources a venture needs and who can best provide them. It shows the critical role an accelerator plays in making the search and acquisition of such resources more efficient. First, they facilitate the recognition of a venture’s resource gap. Second, they bridge the ventures with the appropriate resource providers to fill the identified gaps. Finally, they help close the gaps through making the “rules of the game” more explicit and helping founders navigate informal relationships with such resource providers.
The third chapter is based on another accelerator program where I collected a dataset of 140 “Demo Day” pitches. Seeking to understand what makes pitch “strategies” successful, I used a configurational approach (fuzzy-set QCA). The results illuminate five different “pitch recipes” and suggest that men and women can have different paths to successfully securing funding.
Combined, the above three papers strengthen our understanding of how founders acquire the much-needed resources to get their venture off the ground and what role accelerator programs play in this. Each chapter includes implications for both theory and practice of entrepreneurship and is underpinned by my own entrepreneurial and accelerator experience.
Version
Open Access
Date Issued
2022-08-28
Date Awarded
01/12/2022
License URL
Advisor
ter Wal, Anne
Stigliani, Ileana
Sponsor
Imperial College London
Publisher Department
Business School
Publisher Institution
Imperial College London
Qualification Level
Doctoral
Qualification Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)