Entrepreneurial Management

- RECENT PUBLICATION: Working Paper
  Working Paper | 2019
  Keeping the Little Guy Down: A Debt Trap for Lending with Limited Pledgeability
  Ernest Liu and Benjamin N. Roth
  Microcredit and other forms of small-scale ﬁnance have failed to catalyze entrepreneurship in developing countries. In these credit markets, borrowers and lenders often bargain over not only the division of surplus but also contractual ﬂexibility. We show these lending relationships may lead to endogenous poverty traps for poor borrowers if future income is not pledgeable, yet richer borrowers unambiguously beneﬁt. Improving the bargaining position of rich borrowers can harm poor borrowers, as the lender tightens restrictions and prevents them from growing. The theory rationalizes the low average impact and low demand of microﬁnance despite its high impact on larger businesses.
  Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Developing Countries and Economies; Microfinance; Problems and Challenges;
  
  Citation:
  Liu, Ernest, and Benjamin N. Roth. "Keeping the Little Guy Down: A Debt Trap for Lending with Limited Pledgeability." Working Paper, March 2019. View Details
  Cite View Details Read Now Related
- RECENT PUBLICATION: Article
  Article | Journal of Financial Economics | September 2019
  Bankruptcy Spillovers
  Shai Bernstein, Emanuele Colonnelli, Xavier Giroud and Benjamin Iverson
  How do different bankruptcy approaches affect the local economy? Using US Census microdata, we explore the spillover effects of reorganization and liquidation on geographically proximate firms. We exploit the random assignment of bankruptcy judges as a source of exogenous variation in the probability of liquidation. We find that employment declines substantially in the immediate neighborhood of the liquidated establishments, relative to reorganized establishments. The spillover effects are highly localized and concentrate in nontradable and service sectors, consistent with a reduction in local consumer traffic and a decline in knowledge spillovers between firms. The evidence highlights the externalities that bankruptcy design can impose on nonbankrupt firms.
  Keywords: agglomeration; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Economy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms;
  
  Citation:
  Bernstein, Shai, Emanuele Colonnelli, Xavier Giroud, and Benjamin Iverson. "Bankruptcy Spillovers." Special Issue on Labor and Finance. Journal of Financial Economics 133, no. 3 (September 2019): 608–633. View Details
  Cite View Details Find at Harvard Related
- RECENT PUBLICATION: Case
  Case | HBS Case Collection | August 2019
  Rand Fishkin at Moz (A)
  Thomas R. Eisenmann
  In 2016, senior management at Moz, a venture capital-backed startup providing software tools for digital marketing professionals, must decide how to address a looming cash flow crisis precipitated by failed efforts to broaden its product line. Seattle-based Moz had originally focused only on search engine optimization (SEO) software. Aiming to accelerate growth, over the past three years the startup had launched products targeted at content marketers, social media marketers, and small local businesses. Adoption of these new products had been disappointing, and the resource drain and distraction of launching them had reduced the growth of Moz's core SEO product. Management was wrestling with whether to either: 1) shut down or sell the new products; or 2) double down on the new products, funding further investment in them by selling the core SEO business or milking it as a "cash cow."
  Keywords: Startups; scaling; Entrepreneurship; Failure; Business Startups; Diversification; Growth Management; Technology Industry;
  
  Citation:
  Eisenmann, Thomas R. "Rand Fishkin at Moz (A)." Harvard Business School Case 820-002, August 2019. View Details
  Cite View Details Educators Related

The Entrepreneurial Management Unit strives to raise the level of academic work in the field of entrepreneurship, in methodological rigor, conceptual depth, and managerial applicability. We also strive to improve the odds of entrepreneurial success for our students and for practitioners worldwide.

Because it is such a complex phenomenon, entrepreneurship must be studied through multiple lenses. We use three.

The process of entrepreneurship - We seek to understand the processes of entrepreneurial activity in start-ups and established firms by examining the antecedents and consequences of various forms of entrepreneurial opportunity identification and opportunity pursuit for individuals, organizations, and industries. We see experimentation and innovation in products, services, processes, and business models as central to entrepreneurial activity.
The finance of entrepreneurship - We seek to understand the financing of entrepreneurial ventures by studying the antecedents and consequences of entrepreneurial funding decisions both domestically and internationally.
The context of entrepreneurship - We seek to understand the ways in which entrepreneurs both respond to and shape the context in which they operate, by examining the history of entrepreneurship across time and national borders and by analyzing the legal and cultural contexts for managerial action.

Please also visit the Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship.

Faculty & Research

In The News

Faculty Positions

Contact Information

HBS Working Knowledge

Harvard Business Publishing