A longitudinal analysis of the influence of career motivations on entrepreneurial intention and action

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/cjas.1515
• Author: Francisco Liñán,Servane Delanoë‐Gueguen
• Published date: 01 December 2019
• Date: 01 December 2019

A longitudinal analysis of the influence of career

motivations on entrepreneurial intention and

action

Servane Delanoë-Gueguen*

Toulouse Business School

Francisco Liñán

University of Seville & Anglia Ruskin University

Abstract

The impact of career motivations on entrepreneurial inten-

tion and action remains in need of being investigated con-

jointly. Using a large sample and follow-up data collected

f‌ive years later, we investigate their inf‌luence on the entre-

preneurial involvement of young adults, from the expression

of an intention to entrepreneurial action. We show that only

the search for job security seems to have a persistent effect

throughout the process. In addition, autonomy is associated

with the formation of intention, while wanting to manage full

processes is related to actual start-up participation. We dis-

cuss the theoretical and practical implications. © 2018

ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Keywords: career motivations, regulatory focus, entrepre-

neurial intention, start-up behaviour, longitudinal analysis,

entrepreneurial process

Résumé

L’impact des motivations professionnelles sur l’intention et

l’action entrepreneuriales reste à étudier conjointement. En

nous basant sur un large échantillon interrogé à cinq ans

d’intervalle, nous analysons l’inf‌luence de ces motivations

sur l’implication entrepreneuriale de jeunes adultes, de

l’expressiond’une intention jusqu’àl’action entrepreneuriale.

Nous montrons que seule la recherche de sécurité de l’emploi

semble avoir un effet persistant tout au long du processus. De

plus, l’autonomie est associée à la formation de l’intention,

alors que la volonté de gérer l’intégralité des processus est

liée à la participation entrepreneuriale. Nous discutons les

implications théoriques et pratiques de ces résultats. © 2018

ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Mots-clés: motivations professionnelles, focus régulateur,

intention entrepreneuriale, start-up, analyse longitudinale,

processus entrepreneurial

Introduction

The analysis of the motivations of individuals making

career decisions is crucial for entrepreneurship theory

(Carter, Gartner, Shaver, & Gatewood, 2003; Shane, Locke,

& Collins, 2003), as they are essential for people to form

entrepreneurial intentions and, subsequently, to start compa-

nies (Ajzen & Gilbert Cote, 2008; Renko, Kroeck, &

Bullough, 2012). For some time, the focus of entrepreneur-

ship research shifted away from these motivations to focus

on intention models (Carsrud & Brännback, 2011). These

models consider motivations as distal inf‌luences of intention,

whose effect is mediated by perceived desirability in Shapero

and Sokol’s (1982) Entrepreneurial Event Formation Model

(EEM) and by attitude toward a behaviour in Ajzen’s

(1991) Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB).

Still, research focusing specif‌ically on motivations and

their potential inf‌luence on the transition from intention to

entrepreneurial behaviour has recently been identif‌ied as an

important research area (Fayolle, Liñán, & Moriano, 2014;

Renko et al., 2012; Stephan, Hart, & Drews, 2015). In this

context, Higgins’s (1997) Regulatory Focus Theory (RFT)

could shed some interesting light on the motivations driving

entrepreneurs throughout their entrepreneurial journeys

(Brockner, Higgings, & Low, 2004). This theory suggests

that individuals consider two major decision factors to form

their choices: people with a so-called promotion focus will

be motivated by accomplishments, thereby seeking to

achieve positive outcomes, while those with a prevention fo-

cus will be bearing in mind safety considerations, thereby

seeking to avoid negative outcomes (Higgins, 1997). These

This manuscript has been partly f‌inanced by the project “Longitudinal study

on the process of emergence of high-impact entrepreneurs”, approved and

funded by the Spanish National R&D Plan Ministerio de Economía,

Industria y Competitividad, Gobierno de España (Ref.: ECO2016-75655-P).

*Please address correspondence to: Servane Delanoë-Gueguen, Department

of Strategy, Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Toulouse Business School, 1

Place Alphonse Jourdain –CS 66810, 31068 Toulouse Cedex 7, France.

Email: s.delanoe@tbs-education.fr

Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences

Revue canadienne des sciences de l’administration

Published online 6 November 2018 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/CJAS.1515

36: 527–543 (2019)

Can J Adm Sci

© 2018 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 36(4), 527–543 (2019)527

regulatory foci are intrinsically linked to motivations

(Fischer, Mauer, & Brettel, 2018). While both foci have

virtues, they may play different roles throughout the entre-

preneurial process and it is expected that too much of a pre-

vention focus could hinder entrepreneurial outcomes

(Brockner et al., 2004).

Current research on entrepreneurial motivations faces at

least two problems. The f‌irst one is the lack of prospective

studies ref‌lecting the longitudinal nature of entrepreneurial

journeys, thereby acknowledging the time delays inherent

to entrepreneurial processes (Carsrud & Brännback, 2011;

Carter et al., 2003). In fact, individuals’underlying career

motivations are usually analyzed using cross-sectional data

(Shirokova, Osiyevskyy, & Bogatyreva, 2016). A second

problem is that, despite a few exceptions (Delanoë, 2013;

Delanoë-Gueguen & Fayolle, 2018; Liñán & Rodríguez-

Cohard, 2015; Shinnar, Hsu, Powell, & Zhou, 2017; Van

Gelderen, Kautonen, & Fink, 2015), most studies focus on

the formation of intention, but hardly ever investigate actual

entrepreneurial realization (Fayolle & Liñán, 2014;

Schlaegel & Koenig, 2014). Thus, while it has long been

proposed that varying motivations may be inf‌luencing each

stage and the transition between the entrepreneurial process

stages differently (Shane et al., 2003), their impact on actual

involvement in entrepreneurial endeavours remains in need

of being investigated in a consistent manner (Stephan

et al., 2015). This is all the more important as these motiva-

tions have been shown to inf‌luence the growth subsequently

achieved by the ventures (Cassar, 2007).

In this paper, we therefore address the following re-

search question: how do career motivations impact, f‌irst,

the formation of entrepreneurial intention and, second, the

subsequent involvement in entrepreneurial undertakings?

We rely on the seminal work by Kolvereid (1996) as a

starting point for the motivational beliefs behind career

choices. Our objective of collecting prospective data

including individuals who may or may not be interested in

entrepreneurial careers (Carter et al., 2003; Krueger, Reilly,

& Carsrud, 2000) leads us to f‌irst identify a sample of

upper-division students (Krueger et al., 2000), surveyed

again f‌ive years later, once they had entered professional

life. Based on a parsimonious career motivation scale

representing f‌ive dimensions, we analyze how these dimen-

sions are related to the entrepreneurial intention and the

actual entrepreneurial behaviour of individuals in the f‌ive

years elapsed. Using Structural Equation Modelling

(SEM), we highlight the presence of complex relationships

between the different motivations, intention, and actual

entrepreneurial behaviour, throughout the entrepreneurial

process. We show that only the search for job security, a

prevention-related motivation, has a persistent and hindering

effect throughout the process. However, the search for

autonomy and the willingness to manage the whole process,

both promotion-related motivations, contribute respectively

to the formation of entrepreneurial intention and the

concretization of entrepreneurial outcomes. We know of

very few studies adopting this longitudinal approach

successfully (Liñán & Rodríguez-Cohard, 2015; Shinnar

et al., 2017), as earlier attempts to incorporate entrepreneur-

ial behaviour follow-up data for individuals initially

surveyed during their studies had been unsuccessful, possi-

bly due to limited time intervals (Souitaris, Zerbinati, &

Al-Laham, 2007).

Our study offers several contributions. From a theoret-

ical standpoint, our analysis enables us to highlight the rel-

ative importance of different career motivations at two key

early stages of the entrepreneurial process, namely the for-

mation of entrepreneurial intention, but also the actual sub-

sequent participation in an entrepreneurial project. It also

serves to inform Regulatory Focus Theory in entrepreneur-

ial contexts (Brockner et al., 2004; Higgins, 1997) by

showing the role of specif‌ic promotion- and prevention-

related career motivations in respectively fostering and hin-

dering early entrepreneurial developments. For entrepre-

neurship scholars, our analysis relies on a parsimonious

attitude scale, adapted from Kolvereid’s (1996) original

proposition, which can be used in future entrepreneurship

studies to achieve increased homogeneity and comparabil-

ity. From a methodological standpoint, the use of a large

initial sample and a follow-up study after f‌ive years ensures

the robustness of our proposition. Last but not least, from a

practical standpoint, we identify what motivations are im-

portant for policy makers, educators and start-up advisors

seeking to encourage actual entrepreneurial involvement

rather than just intention.

In the following section, we present our literature re-

view starting with the presentation of career motivations in

entrepreneurial contexts, their theoretical groundings within

the Theory of Planned Behaviour (Ajzen, 1991), and their

relationship with Regulatory Focus Theory (Brockner

et al., 2004; Higgins, 1997). This leads us to present our re-

search model. We then turn to our methodology and the pre-

sentation of our data analysis. After that, we discuss our

results, and conclude by showing their limitations and op-

portunities for future research.

Theoretical Background and Hypothesis Development

Intentionality has long been a characteristic attributed to

entrepreneurial behaviour (Carter et al., 2003; Krueger,

2009), as the choice of an entrepreneurial path goes through

various phases of increasing engagement, from the forma-

tion of an entrepreneurial intention to actual entrepreneurial

behaviour (Carsrud & Brännback, 2011; Delanoë-Gueguen

& Fayolle, 2018). In this context, scholars have been seek-

ing to understand which career motivations lead some indi-

viduals rather than others to enter and progress through

entrepreneurial journeys.

CAREER MOTIVATIONS, ENTREPRENEURIAL INTENTION AND ACTION DELANOË-GUEGUEN &LIÑÁN

Can J Adm Sci

© 2018 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 528 36(4), 527–543 (2019)