Abstract
The world is in the midst of a new wave of technological disruption with entrepreneurship and innovation as the catalysts. Yet, organizations struggle with the proper strategies to initiate innovative activity among their people. Corporate entrepreneurship (CE) is a term used to describe entrepreneurial behavior inside established midsized and large organizations. The value of CE lies in the extent to which it becomes a strategy to engage in an ongoing process of entrepreneurial actions to achieve a competitive advantage. Moreover, a lack of innovative (or entrepreneurial) actions in today’s global economy could be a recipe for failure. Because the next generation of business students will be focusing on major corporations for initial positions, this article examines the domain of CE, how pedagogy can be developed for the classroom, and the emerging future topics that demonstrate the continuing importance of CE for teaching and research.
Introduction
The development, application, and enhancement of new technologies are occurring at a breathtaking pace, and innovation is driving the way business is conducted. As the number of new ventures, products, processes, technologies, and patents literally explodes worldwide, established companies can either innovate their future or become victims of innovation. The world is in the midst of a new wave of technological disruption with entrepreneurship and innovation as the catalysts. Yet, organizations struggle with the proper strategies to initiate innovative activity among their people (Kuratko, Covin, & Hornsby, 2014). For educators and researchers in the entrepreneurship field, this is a critical component to examine if contemporary students are to be prepared for the disruptive future they will confront.
It is clear that today’s environment is filled with many contradictions, and dealing with paradox becomes a critical aspect of managing in the new innovative landscape. Today, we must embrace contradiction by replacing or with and (McNulty, 2017). For instance, quality can be higher, and operating costs can be lower. Firms must innovate and operate with less risk. There needs to achieve greater autonomy and a sense of centrality. The pathway through such paradoxes involves fostering and promoting entrepreneurial activity. If history is the true roadmap of the future, then any organizational advancement will always rise from the energy and passion that define the entrepreneurial spirit within individuals. Entrepreneurial activity is the result of each individual’s creativity, passion, and tenacity. The one true strategy that unleashes individual innovators is corporate entrepreneurship (CE).
CE is a term used to describe entrepreneurial behavior inside established midsized and large organizations (Stopford & Baden-Fuller, 1994). Other popular or related terms include organizational entrepreneurship, intrapreneurship, corporate venturing, and strategic entrepreneurship (Morris, Kuratko, & Covin, 2011; Pinchott, 1985). Regardless of the reason the firm decides to engage in CE, it has become a major strategy in all types of organizations (Ireland, Covin, & Kuratko, 2009).
While innovative actions are a phenomenon that have captivated the interest of executives in many corporate boardrooms as well as university classrooms, there is a danger in getting too caught up in the excitement of a particular innovation or inspiring stories of individual corporate innovators. It is easy to become enamored with the idea of innovation as the word is fast becoming an overhyped “buzzword” among corporations, universities, and even governments. One recent article in Wired magazine called it the most important and overused word in America (O'Bryan, 2013).
A corporate entrepreneurial strategy represents the guiding light and the motivating force for organizations as they attempt to sustain advantage in the marketplace. It is therefore an imperative that educators and researchers continue to explore and teach the newest concepts of CE to instill a full understanding in the next generation of organizational leaders.
To convey a greater understanding of how the CE field has evolved to a point of such importance, this article begins with a review of the specific domains of CE, followed by an exploration of pedagogical approaches to teaching CE, and finally an examination of the emerging future topics that demonstrate the continuing importance of CE for teaching and research.
Domains of CE
An Evolving Focus
The concept of CE has evolved over the last four decades. Definitions have varied considerably over time. The early research in the 1970’s focused on venture teams and basic notions of how entrepreneurship could exist inside established organizations (Hanan, 1976; Hill & Hlavacek, 1972; Peterson & Berger, 1972).
In the 1980’s, researchers conceptualized CE as entrepreneurial behavior requiring organizational sanctions and resource commitments for the purpose of developing different types of value-creating innovations. In other words, it concerned extending the firm’s domain of competence and its opportunity set through innovation (Alterowitz, 1988; Burgelman, 1983a, 1983b, 1984; Kanter, 1985; Sathe, 1989; Schollhammer, 1982; Sykes & Block, 1989). During this decade, the term intrapreneurship was introduced (Pinchott, 1985).
By the 1990’s, researchers had adjusted the focus to include reenergizing and enhancing the firm’s ability to develop the skills through which innovations could be created (Barringer & Bluedorn, 1999; Birkinshaw, 1997; Borch, Huse, & Senneseth, 1999; Jennings & Young, 1990; Merrifield, 1993; Zahra, 1991; Zahra, Kuratko, & Jennings, 1999). More comprehensive definitions began to take shape during this period, such as Guth and Ginsberg’s (1990) distinction between two major types of phenomena: new venture creation within existing organizations and the transformation of ongoing organizations through strategic renewal. Similarly, Sharma and Chrisman (1999) suggested that CE “is the process where by an individual or a group of individuals, in association with an existing organization, create a new organization or instigate renewal or innovation within that organization” (p. 18).
By the start of the 21st century, CE had become relatively well defined as a field of study—thanks in large part due to the work of scholars to reconcile past works into a holistic viewpoint. The development of innovation competencies through CE continued to receive attention in this decade, but this innovation was manifested in a variety of ways, as reflected in a series of key articles. Ahuja and Lambert (2001) used empirical evidence from the chemicals industry to present a model explaining how large established firms created breakthroughs. Smith and DiGregorio (2002) offered a theory of discovery and entrepreneurial action and examined the varying market effects of entrepreneurial actions. They were addressing what has become known as the strategic entrepreneurship segment of CE. Schildt, Maula, and Kiel (2005) examined explorative versus exploitative learning interactions in corporate venturing, indicating that the governance structure of these external ventures was key in determining the type of learning that took place. With all of these various perspectives offering new insights, it became clear that CE is more complex and can take a number of different forms. As a result, the contemporary approach acknowledges particular domains into which these corporate entrepreneurial activities can be categorized.
Many of the elements essential to constructing a theoretically grounded understanding of the domains of CE can now be identified. Based on the work of Kuratko and Audretsch (2013) and Morris et al. (2011), CE can be manifested in companies either through corporate venturing or strategic entrepreneurship.
Corporate venturing is concerned with the launching of new ventures, and this can be further broken down into two subcategories. The first of these would be innovative ventures created within the firm, referred to as internal corporate ventures (ICVs). With internal corporate venturing, new businesses are created and owned by the corporation and typically reside within the current corporate structure (Kuratko, Covin, & Garrett, 2009). The second activity would be any innovation that is created outside of the firm, referred to as external corporate ventures. External corporate venturing involves new businesses that are created by parties outside the corporation and subsequently invested in or acquired by the corporation. These external businesses are typically very young ventures or early growth-stage firms (Covin & Miles, 2007; Morris et al., 2011). They could also include joint ventures created in partnership with another firm.
Strategic entrepreneurship approaches refer to a broad array of significant entrepreneurial activities or innovations that are adopted in the firm’s pursuit of competitive advantage. They usually do not result in new businesses for the corporation. With strategic entrepreneurship, innovation can be found within any of five areas—the firm’s strategy, product offerings, served markets, internal organization (i.e., structure, processes, and capabilities), or business model (Kuratko & Audretsch, 2013). These innovations can constitute a firm’s fundamental differentiation from its industry rivals. Hence, there are two possible reference points that can be considered when a firm exhibits strategic entrepreneurship: (a) how much the firm is transforming itself relative to where it was before (e.g., transforming its products, markets, internal processes, etc.) and (b) how much the firm is transforming itself relative to industry conventions or standards (again, in terms of product offerings, market definitions, internal processes, and so forth). Strategic entrepreneurship can take one of five forms—strategic renewal (adoption of a new strategy), sustained regeneration (introduction of a new product or service into an existing category), domain redefinition (reconfiguration of existing product or market categories), organizational rejuvenation (internally focused innovation for strategy improvement), and business model reconstruction (redesign of existing business model; Covin & Miles, 1999; Hitt, Ireland, Camp, & Sexton, 2001; Ireland, Hitt, & Sirmon, 2003; Ireland & Webb, 2007; Kuratko & Audretsch, 2009).
Related to these various activities and domains is the question of how entrepreneurial an organization tends to be. The concept Entrepreneurial Orientation (EO) was developed by Miller (1983) and formalized in the entrepreneurship literature by Covin and Slevin (1989, 1991; see also Morris & Paul, 1987). Here, a continuum of a firm’s strategic behavioral proclivities is recognized. A firm’s orientation can range more conservative to more entrepreneurial, with the entrepreneurial end of the spectrum evidenced by innovativeness (the introduction of new products, processes, and business models); proactiveness (actively entering new product/market spaces and seeking market leadership positions); and risk-taking (a willingness among strategic decisionmakers to contribute resources to projects with uncertain outcomes). A large number of scholars subsequently examined the performance implications of a firm’s EO (e.g., Lumpkin & Dess, 1996; Morris & Sexton, 1996; Rauch, Wiklund, Lumpkin, & Frese, 2009; Stam & Elfring, 2008), generally finding a positive relationship between EO and performance. Others have questioned EO’s underlying dimensions and how they are measured (Lumpkin, Cogliser, & Schneider, 2009; Lumpkin & Dess, 2001; Stevenson & Gumbert, 1985). Over the years, a number of alternative perspectives on the conceptual domain of a firm-level strategic orientation toward entrepreneurship have been proposed (see the EO Models section of Covin & Wales, 2012 for a discussion of the different conceptualizations). Nonetheless, as noted in two recent meta-analyses, the Miller/Covin and Slevin conceptualization is by far the dominant perspective of EO in the relevant literature (Rauch et al., 2009; Rosenbusch, Rauch, & Bausch, 2013).
A critical question raised by the considerable volume of nomological research on EO concerns the extent to which it is more of an attitude, outlook, or perspective within an organization, or whether it is more behavioral in nature. Drawing from measurement theory, Anderson, Kreiser, Kuratko, Hornsby, and Eshima (2015) propose a formative construction of EO that includes both managerial attitudes (e.g., toward innovation or risk) and entrepreneurial behaviors as jointly necessary dimensions that collectively form the higher order EO construct.
In essence, corporate venturing, strategic entrepreneurship, and EO combine to form the overall domain of CE. Building on these elements, it becomes possible to develop a CE strategy.
Establishing Pedagogy for CE
A CE Course for Educators
While CE is sometimes approached as a module or set of modules in a more general entrepreneurship course, at many institutions around the world, it is taught as a standalone course or seminar (Morris, Kuratko, & Cornwall, 2013). However, there is no standard structure for the CE course. The approach to course design will tend to vary depending on the objectives of the instructor, the level of the student, and the amount of time allocated for the course.
From a content perspective, the following is an example of the topics around which a CE course might be organized:
How organizations evolve; the strategic challenge confronting organizations; What it means to be entrepreneurial; the concept of EO; Differences between start-up and CE; Forms that entrepreneurship takes inside corporations; Who is the corporate entrepreneur? Entrepreneurs versus managers; A framework for understanding obstacles to CE; Innovation, technology and CE; the innovation portfolio; Setting goals and formulating entrepreneurial strategies; Types of organizational structures and CE; The role of control systems, budget systems and cost systems; Internal venture capital; How the HRM system can facilitate CE; Critical aspects and issues surrounding the corporate culture; People issues: Resistance to change and fear of failure; Entrepreneurship within different functional areas of a company; Ethics and the corporate entrepreneur? Course wrap-up;
A number of learning resources are available to support the delivery of a CE course. Examples of standard textbooks include Morris et al. (2011), Sathe (2007), Hisrich and Kearney (2011), Burns (2008), and Desouza (2011). These are general texts around which a course can be designed. A wide range of other books, such as Good to Great (Collins, 2001), The Innovator’s Dilemma (Christensen, 2013), and Open Innovation (Chesbrough, 2006) represent good supplements when teaching a CE course.
For many students, entrepreneurship inside a large, established company is further removed, conceptually, from their life experiences, especially compared with start-up entrepreneurship. As such, it becomes important to integrate experiential learning tools into the CE classroom. Toward this end, excellent case studies are available to augment lectures and other course activities. These delve into a range of challenges in organizing for entrepreneurship and seeing projects through the entrepreneurial process. Cases can be found through a search of “CE” in the online case study sites of Harvard Business Publishing, Darden Business Publishing at the University of Virginia, the Case Centre at Ivey Publishing, and other case clearing houses.
Other experiential or application-oriented resources can be found online. A series of podcasts entitled How I Built This is available from National Public Radio in the United States. Here, fairly in-depth and personal insights are provided as founders of a number of prominent firms describe the challenges of sustaining growth and innovation beyond the initial start-up. In addition, shorter videos that address a host of topics and examples related to CE and innovation inside companies can be found on YouTube and through online TED talks.
In addition to these application-oriented resources, engaging students by having them complete some sort of course project can greatly enhance the learning process. One direction for such a project could involve a research article. Students might synthesize available scholarly and applied research and take positions on such topics as reward systems that encourage CE, the design of internal venture capital funds, or top-down versus bottom-up approaches to CE. Another direction is more experiential. Here, students might be required to conduct and write up an interview with someone who has been involved with innovative projects inside a larger, established company. While many other possibilities exist, we encourage educators to consider having students conduct an audit of a company from an entrepreneurial perspective.
An Entrepreneurial Health Audit
How do we instill an understanding in students about the critical elements of the internal environment, the roles of managers, and the entrepreneurial strategy of a firm? A useful class project is called the Entrepreneurial Health Audit (Ireland, Kuratko, & Morris, 2006a, 2006b). Students are put into teams and assigned to a midsized or large company that has agreed to participate in exchange for a final report and presentation assessing the firm from an entrepreneurial vantage point. The Audit involves a systematic approach that involves three steps or stages.
Step I: Assessing the company’s entrepreneurial intensity
The entrepreneurial performance of a company at a given point in time is reflected in its entrepreneurial intensity (EI) score. EI is an extension of EO and is concerned with both the degree and frequency of entrepreneurship (Morris & Sexton, 1996).
To assess degree of entrepreneurship, measures are needed of the organization’s EO that consists of innovativeness, risk-taking, and proactiveness. Innovativeness refers to the seeking of creative, unusual, or novel solutions to problems and needs. These solutions take the form of new technologies and processes, as well as new products and services. Risk-taking involves the willingness to commit significant resources to opportunities having a reasonable chance of costly failure. These risks are typically manageable and calculated. Proactiveness is concerned with pursuing initiatives in advance of rivals’ actions, with doing what is necessary to anticipate and act upon an entrepreneurial opportunity. Such pioneering behavior usually entails considerable perseverance, adaptability, and tolerance of failure. Assessment of frequency of entrepreneurship involves measuring the number of new products, services, and process innovations introduced over some defined time period (e.g., the last 2 years).
A proven measurement instrument for assessing EI within a company can be found in Morris et al. (2011). It allows students to graphically capture the position of a company on a grid that has degree on the vertical axis and frequency on the horizontal axis. When interpreting EI scores, it is important to recognize that norms for EI will differ among industries. One is attempting to achieve higher levels of EI not in absolute terms, but relative to a specific industry standard. Measurement of EI also provides numerous opportunities for developing a richer understanding of how entrepreneurship works in a particular company. For example, the relative importance of degree and frequency when measuring entrepreneurial actions may vary depending on certain strategic factors, such as the pace of technological change in an industry, the levels of competitive intensity, or the heterogeneity of market demand. Also, the conditions under which degree or frequency is the strongest contributor to performance can be assessed. It has been speculated that frequency and degree may contribute fairly equally to short-term results, whereas a greater degree of entrepreneurship has a stronger long-term impact. In any event, the EI is a powerful assessment tool for capturing entrepreneurship at the organization or division level.
Step II: Diagnosing the climate for CE
While the assessment of EI captures how entrepreneurial the company is, a need also exists to determine the underlying reasons why a given level of EI is being achieved. In a sense, management must determine the entrepreneurial health of the organization. The Corporate Entrepreneurship Assessment Instrument (CEAI) is a diagnostic tool for assessing, evaluating, and managing the internal environment of the company in a manner that supports entrepreneurship (Hornsby, Kuratko, & Zahra, 2002; Kuratko, Montagno, & Hornsby, 1990). By taking inventory of the company’s current situation as seen through the eyes of managers, executives can identify organizational systems and structures that are inconsistent with, or represent obstacles to, higher levels of EI.
The CEAI is designed around five key antecedents to the creation of sustainable entrepreneurship within a company—management support; work discretion/autonomy; reinforcement; time availability; and organizational boundaries. The full CEAI survey and its scoring instructions can be found in Kuratko et al. (2014). It consists of 48 Likert-style questions. The instrument has been shown to be psychometrically sound as a viable means for assessing areas requiring attention and improvement to achieve intended results through use of a CE strategy. The instrument can be used to develop a profile of a company across the dimensions and internal environment variables previously described. Low scores in an area suggest the need for training activities, redesign of systems or processes, restructuring, or other managerial changes to enhance the company’s readiness for entrepreneurial behavior and implementation of a CE strategy.
Essentially concerned with a company’s “entrepreneurial health,” the instrument can significantly benefit organizations and would be of interest to both organizational practitioners, researchers, and students. For managers, the instrument provides an indication of a company’s likelihood of being able to successfully implement a CE strategy. It highlights areas of the work environment that should be the focus of ongoing design and development efforts. Further, the CEAI can be used as an assessment tool for students attempting to evaluate a company as part of the entrepreneurial health audit.
The tacit knowledge of managers at the executive, middle, and operating levels regarding the role of entrepreneurship within the company and what the company is explicitly doing to reinforce entrepreneurial behavior is critical. Managers are most likely to engage in entrepreneurial behavior when the organizational antecedents to that behavior are well-designed and well-communicated. Individuals assess their entrepreneurial capacities in reference to what they perceive to be is a set of organizational resources, opportunities, and obstacles related to entrepreneurial activity. Determining that the value of entrepreneurial behavior exceeds that of other behaviors leads managers to champion, synthesize, facilitate, and implement.
Step III: Create an organization-wide understanding of CE
Having assessed the entrepreneurial performance and the internal environment, the third step in the health audit involves determining the degree to which a CE strategy and the entrepreneurial behavior through which it is implemented are understood and accepted by affected parties. A CE strategy is implemented successfully only when all actors are committed to it. Hence, individuals must be aware of the intent and mission surrounding a CE strategy. Key decision-makers must find ways to explain their intent and mission to those from whom entrepreneurial efforts are expected. In addition, the readiness of each actor to display entrepreneurial behavior should be realistically assessed. Actions to enhance entrepreneurial skills of employees should then be set into motion. These commitments and processes help to shape a common vision around the importance of a CE strategy and entrepreneurial behavior as the cornerstone to an effective strategic adaptation process. As a way for organizations to develop a sound program for understanding entrepreneurial activity, a CE employee development program can be established. Some suggested elements for such a program can be found in Kuratko, Covin, and Hornsby (2014).
The Importance of CE Strategy
Strategy has two key facets when it comes to CE. Morris et al. (2011) contend that when the strategy-making efforts taken to create competitive advantages and exploit them are grounded in entrepreneurial actions, the firm is employing an entrepreneurial strategy. Here, then, we are talking about being entrepreneurial in how management specifies the overall direction of the firm and how it adapts to changing environmental contingencies (Russell, 1999). Further, when establishing direction and priorities for the various product, service, process, and business model innovation efforts of the firm, the company is formulating its strategy for entrepreneurship. Management is now determining the role of entrepreneurship and how it can be facilitated within the firm. If we compare these two strategies, both address issues that are external and internal to the firm. However, the application of entrepreneurial thinking to the firm’s core strategy is primarily dealing with external questions such as identifying the unmet needs in the market and how the firm can best pursue innovation on a sustained basis. Alternatively, the development of a strategy for entrepreneurship is especially concerned with internal questions, including the appropriate entrepreneurial environment for employees to seek and discover company innovations. Clearly, both aspects of a CE strategy are needed (Morris et al., 2011).
For successful CE, those within the firm must be encouraged and supported in how to think and act in entrepreneurial ways. Without awareness, encouragement, and nurturing, the entrepreneurial behavior that is linked to CE will not surface or be used consistently throughout the firm (Kuratko, Ireland, & Hornsby, 2001). Furthermore, an awareness of what CE calls for in terms of behavior on the part of individuals permits an analysis of choices. Typically, organizational members compare and evaluate the opportunity costs of engaging in entrepreneurial behavior with those of either not doing so or engaging in other behaviors. Thus, linking CE activities to strategy and processes is important (Dess, Lumpkin, & MvGee, 1999).
A more integrated definition of a CE strategy was outlined by Ireland et al. (2009) as “a vision-directed, organization-wide reliance on entrepreneurial behavior that purposefully and continuously rejuvenates the organization and shapes the scope of its operations through the recognition and exploitation of entrepreneurial opportunity” (p. 21). The strategy is heavily driven by the essential roles of managers, so students must be aware of their future expectations in these positions.
The Essential Roles of Managers
Managers, at all organizational levels, have critical strategic roles to fulfill for the organization to be successful (Ireland, Hitt, & Vaidyanath, 2002). Senior-, middle-, and first-level managers have distinct responsibilities that are then associated with particular managerial actions (Floyd & Lane, 2000), and this becomes especially relevant when we consider CE.
In examining the role of senior-level managers in the process of CE, Burgelman (1984) contends that their principal involvement concerns corporate strategy and setting the strategic and structural context within which entrepreneurial behavior can occur. In particular, senior-level managers are responsible for retroactively rationalizing selected new businesses into the firm’s portfolio and developing strategy based on their evaluations of those businesses’ prospects as desirable, value-creating components of the firm. They play an important selecting role in CE. Senior-level managers are also responsible for structuring the organization in ways that facilitate the development and eventual integration of new business ventures embraced as part of the firm’s strategic context.
Ling, Simsek, Lubatkin, and Veiga (2008) examined 152 firms in regard to the impact of a “transformational” CEO on CE. This study provided impetus to the importance of the directing role that top management must embrace. Thus, senior-level managers have critical roles in the articulation of an entrepreneurial strategic vision and instigating the emergence of an organizational climate conducive to entrepreneurial activity. In addition, senior-level managers are centrally involved in the defining processes of both the corporate venturing and strategic entrepreneurship forms of CE, as they provide leadership to various entrepreneurial initiatives.
Over the years, evidence indicates that middle-level managers are a hub through which most organizational knowledge flows (Floyd & Wooldridge, 1992, 1994; King, Fowler, & Zeithaml, 2001). To interact effectively with first-level managers, middle-level managers must possess the technical competence required to understand the firm’s core competencies, particularly as they relate to management and development of entrepreneurial initiatives. Simultaneously, in their interaction with senior-level executives, middle-level managers must understand the firm’s strategic intent and goals. Through interactions with senior- and first-level managers, those operating in the middle of an organization’s leadership hierarchy influence and shape the operationalization of the firm’s corporate entrepreneurial strategy.
Consistent with this view, Kuratko, Ireland, Covin, and Hornsby (2005) argue that the middle-level manager’s work as a change agent and promoter of innovation is facilitated by their positioning in the organization hierarchy. These authors contend that middle-level managers endorse, refine, and shepherd entrepreneurial initiatives and identify, acquire, and deploy resources needed to pursue those initiatives. These roles can be further broken explained as follows. Endorsement: Middle-level managers often find themselves in evaluative positions with entrepreneurial initiatives emerging from lower levels in the firm. Then, middle-level managers must endorse selected initiatives to the top levels of the organization. They must also endorse initiatives originating at the top-level and “sell” their value-creating potential to the primary implementers—first-level managers. Refinement involves molding the entrepreneurial opportunity into one that makes sense for the organization, given the organization’s strategy, resources, and structure. Middle-level managers must convert potential entrepreneurial opportunities into initiatives that fit the organization. Shepherding: Middle-level managers champion and guide the entrepreneurial initiative to assure that those originating at lower levels in the firm are not abandoned once their continued development requires higher level support. Identification involves knowing which resources will be needed to convert the entrepreneurial initiative into a business reality as these initiatives tend to evolve in their scope, content, and focus as they develop (McGrath & MacMillan, 1995). Acquisition: Middle-level managers are responsible for redirecting resources away from existing operations and toward entrepreneurial initiatives appearing to have greater strategic value for the firm (Burgelman, 1984). In short, it might be argued that the middle management level is where entrepreneurial opportunities are given the best chance to flourish based on the resources likely to be deployed as they are pursued.
According to Floyd and Lane (2000), first-level managers have experimenting, adjusting, and conforming roles. The experimenting role is expressed through the initiating of entrepreneurial projects. The adjusting role is expressed through, for example, a first-level manager responding to recognized and unplanned entrepreneurial challenges. Finally, the conforming role is expressed through first-level managers’ adaptation of operating policies and procedures to the strategic initiatives endorsed at higher organizational levels.
To better understand entrepreneurial actions and the role of management, Hornsby, Kuratko, Shepherd, and Bott (2009) conducted a study of 458 managers at different levels in their firms. They found that the relationship between perceived internal antecedents (as measured by the CEAI mentioned earlier) and entrepreneurial actions (measured by the number of new ideas implemented) differed depending on managerial level. Specifically, the positive relationship between managerial support and entrepreneurial action was stronger for senior- and middle-level managers than for first-level (lower level) managers. The positive relationship between work discretion and entrepreneurial action was also stronger for senior- and middle-level managers than for first-level managers. The few studies that have explored managerial level have emphasized the role of first-level managers in a “bottom-up” process of CE (Burgelman, 1983a, 1983b, 1984). The Hornsby et al. (2009) study offered a counter view to this “bottom-up” perspective, supporting the notion that higher level managers have greater ability to “make more of” conditions in the company and thus implement a greater number entrepreneurial ideas than do first-level managers.
Working jointly, senior-, middle-, and first-level managers are responsible for developing the entrepreneurial behaviors that can be used to form the capabilities through which future competitive success can be achieved (Kuratko, Hornsby, & Bishop, 2005). Thus, organizations developing an environment conducive to entrepreneurial activity must recognize that there is an integrated set of roles at the senior, middle, and first levels of management.
Emerging Topics in CE
As the field of CE has become more defined, both the depth and breadth of topical coverage in the published research have increased. New theoretical and empirical insights regularly appear that address ever more specific issues, expanding the richness of what can be taught in CE courses.
Examples of some of the contemporary topics receiving attention include the following:
Corporate venture capital and its role in supporting innovation within firms (Wadhwa, Phelps, & Kotha, 2016; Weber, Bauke, & Raibulet, 2016). External corporate venturing as a means for acquiring new innovations (Basu, Phelps, & Kotha, 2016; Titus, House, & Covin, 2017). Women and their role in corporate entrepreneurial activity (Lyngsie & Foss, 2017). Understanding employee innovative behaviors (Kang, Matusik, Kim, & Phillips, 2016). Validation and termination processes for corporate entrepreneurial projects (Behrens & Patzelt, 2016; Fisher, Kuratko, Bloodgood, & Hornsby, 2017). Control system factors that influence or restrain corporate entrepreneurial activity (Goodale, Kuratko, Hornsby, & Covin, 2011). Cognitive processes and corporate entrepreneurs (Corbett & Hmieleski, 2007; Garrett & Holland, 2015). The extension of CE to small- and medium-sized firms and not-for-profit institutions (Kearney & Morris, 2015; Nason, McKelvie, & Lumpkin, 2015). The role of CE in family firms (Minola, Brumana, Campopiano, Garrett, & Cassia, 2016). The evolution of the value proposition and subsequent performance of ICVs (Covin, Garrett, Kuratko, & Shepherd, 2015). How learning proficiency of ICVs is related to venture performance (Covin, Garrett, Gupta, Kuratko, & Shepherd, in press). The emotional process for both managers and employees in CE (Biniari, 2012). The personal experience of failure when pursuing an innovative project (Shepherd, Covin, & Kuratko, 2009; Shepherd & Kuratko, 2009).
As these topics demonstrate, CE is a dynamic concept growing in importance every year. These and other topics within the CE realm will continue to emerge in our classrooms. So as educators and scholars, we must push the envelope to better prepare students for the innovative challenges that confront tomorrow’s organizations.
Conclusion
In this article, we have shown that educators in the entrepreneurship domain must view CE as holding tremendous significance with so many students beginning careers in major established organizations. Because exponential changes happening in today’s organizations due to the ever-increasing speed of disruptive innovations, students need to be prepared for the challenges that lie ahead of them. Using a tool such as the Entrepreneurial Health Audit, students can gain the experience of gauging an organization’s internal environment for CE activities. Not only will they learn more about the challenges of implementing CE but also retain a valuable tool that could eventually be applied in the organization that employs them.
So, CE is the critical challenge confronting today’s organizations in this disruptive age. It is clear that this topic should continue to be embraced by both entrepreneurship educators and researchers.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.