Startups have emerged as a promising avenue for the creation of jobs and economic growth, empowered by various kinds of support available to entrepreneurs to help them develop their businesses. Nevertheless, success remains confined to a few, and building a successful startup requires access to a wide array of resources, among them financial capital, information, knowledge and extended social networks with key people. It is challenging for most entrepreneurs to simultaneously secure these resources and develop the skills required to build reputation and networks, work as a team, with investors, partners and clients, and to push their ideas forward to create successful startups.
Launched in May 2017 in Barcelona, Spain, this project looks at the production and evaluation of value during the early stage of startup creation. With this aim, we examine how people cooperate in creating businesses and how the latter are evaluated in relation to the market at the micro-sociological level of everyday interactions. This project is, therefore, an invitation to look beyond the common view of the entrepreneur as a lone runner to investigate the role of multiple stakeholders at different stages of the creation process, the evolution of their cooperation networks, what kinds of problems and challenges they face, and how their practices contribute to shaping the culture of entrepreneurship.
The project is led by Guillaume Dumont and funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (MINECO) through the Juan de la Cierva program, a highly competitive funding program for talented early career researchers. The project is hosted by the Sociological Research Centre on Everyday Life and Work (QUIT) of the Department of Sociology at the Autonomous University of Barcelona.
Start date: 01/06/2017
Finish date: 01/06/2019
Funding: Ministerio de EconomÃa y Competitividad
Responsable researcher: Guillaume Dumont
