Entrepreneurial wisdom: incorporating the ethical and strategic dimensions of entrepreneurial decision-making. (6th March 2008)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Dunham, Laura; McVea, John; Freeman, R. Edward
• Is Part Of: International journal of entrepreneurship and small business. Volume 6:Number 1(2008)
• Page Start: 8
• Page End: 19
• Publication Date: 2008-03-06
• Subjects: entrepreneurship -- wisdom -- ethics -- stakeholder management -- entrepreneurial decision making -- strategy; Entrepreneurship -- Periodicals; Small business -- Management -- Periodicals; 658.42105
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1476-1297

Abstract

Entrepreneurs face particularly ambiguous and complex decision contexts (Busenitz and Barney, 1997). Furthermore, many of the decisions entrepreneurs make are fraught with ethical tensions, given the many moral considerations and consequences that arise from entrepreneurial action (e.g., Dees and Starr, 1992). However, while a growing body of work in entrepreneurial cognition (e.g., Mitchell et al., 2004; Forbes, 1999) has sought to understand how entrepreneurs make decisions despite uncertainty, and various decision-making models have been put forth, to date very little of this work has explored how entrepreneurs address the ethical dimensions of the decisions they make. In this paper, we offer a conceptualisation of entrepreneurial wisdom that we believe addresses the need to better integrate the ethical dimensions into entrepreneurial decision making. Such an approach enables us to adopt an explicitly creative, aesthetic and adaptive perspective that is well suited to the dynamic and complex challenges of the entrepreneurial context.