The impact that the small business sector has on the economy is well known and has been extensively studied. In 2008, 46% of the Swedish workforce in the private sector were employed by small businesses, the small businesses where also accountable for 42% of GDP, these are just some arguments in behalf of the impact that they have on the Swedish economy. Reviewing theories of entrepreneurship this paper asks if maybe a disproportionate part of the impact dealt by the small business sector comes from the entrepreneurial ventures that operate within that same sector. Because small businesses and entrepreneurial ventures in the small business sector find themselves in an overlap they are often confused with each other. Many studies fail to differentiate between these to organizational structures and therefore the impact on the economy dealt by entrepreneurial ventures is joined with the impact that is dealt by small businesses. With a qualitative approach, the use of two case studies and discussing theories developed by scholars in the field, this paper identifies an entrepreneurial venture that operates within the small business sector and compares it to an ordinary non-entrepreneurial small business that operates within that same sector. With the use of further theories it also identifies which of the two organisations that has the greatest impact on economic development. The results lead to the conclusion that a differentiation between entrepreneurial ventures and ordinary small businesses needs do be done so that political efforts, academic research and literature in the field can be reallocated towards entrepreneurial ventures and the field of entrepreneurship as a whole. The paper also gives suggestions for further research with the use of a quantitative approach and greater sample size so that results can be generalized.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:lnu-36594 |
| Date | January 2014 |
| Creators | Gavilan Sjöström, Oliver |
| Publisher | Linnéuniversitetet, Institutionen för organisation och entreprenörskap (OE) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
Page generated in 0.0072 seconds