19250: Nature & Nurture: Developing a Research Agenda at the Intersection of Parenting & Entrepreneurship

Are entrepreneurs born or made? There has been much research on predictors of entrepreneurial entry, trying to uncover why certain people pursue entrepreneurship while others do not. However, most research overlooks the individuals responsible for both the birthing and nurturing of future entrepreneurs—parents. While family dynamics have been known to be critical to preserving transgenerational entrepreneurship, recent research has started to examine how parents, parental styles, and inherited parental identities shape who becomes an entrepreneur and how individuals perform as entrepreneurs. The influence of parents on entrepreneurship is thereby unique yet also pervasive in that it operates over a long time span, starting from when the child is born until they become adults and start/run a business. Parenting is a complex and multidimensional process, which makes understanding parents’ role in their children’s entrepreneurial pursuits challenging. This PDW, therefore, aims to (1) map this emerging research frontier by establishing a research agenda to better understand the interrelationship of entrepreneurship and parents and (2) bring together an interdisciplinary community of scholars to discuss, plan, and pursue aspects of the agenda. Participants in this PDW will work collaboratively to draft a proposal for a special issue on this important yet understudied topic.