What you know or who you know? The role of intellectual and social capital in opportunity recognition

By Antonio-Rafael Ramos-Rodríguez, José Aurelio Medina-Garrido, J. Lorenzo-Gomez, J. Ruiz-Navarro. 2010

227 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The recognition of business opportunities is the first stage in the entrepreneurial process. This article analyses the effects of individuals’ possession of and access to knowledge on the probability of recognizing good business opportunities in their area of residence. The authors use an eclectic theoretical framework, consisting of intellectual and social capital concepts. In particular, they analyse the role of individuals’ educational level, their perception that they have the right knowledge and skills to start a business, whether they own and manage a firm, their contacts with other entrepreneurs, and whether they have been business angels. The hypotheses proposed here are tested using data collected for the GEM project in Spain in 2007. The results show that individuals’ access to external knowledge through the social networks in which they participate, is fundamental for developing the capacity to recognize new business opportunities.

Subfields: Management of Technology and Innovation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/c8fce321da80e5708e34b0ad041cddb616c14d70

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Management of Technology and Innovation

Citations in the corpus

The role of intellectual resources, product innovation capability, reputational resources and marketing capability combinations in firm growth (2014, background): “The importance of social capital is acknowledged (Anderson et al., 2007; Gao et al., 2013; Lee and Jones, 2008; Ramos-Rodriguez et al., 2010; Totterman and Sten, 2005; Wincent et al., 2013).”
A systematic literature review of entrepreneurial opportunity recognition: insights on influencing factors (2014, background): “Some examples of these factors are human and social capital (DeTienne and Chandler 2007; Ramos-Rodríguez et al. 2010), individual traits (Zahra et al.”
Psychological capital and the startup capital–entrepreneurial success relationship (2016, background): “Psychological capital involves the entrepreneur’s conviction that he/ she has the ability to start a venture and the capacity to recognize and utilize business opportunities (Ramos-Rodr ıguez et al. 2010), which Luthans, Luthans, and Luthans (2004) refer to as positive psychological capital.”
The theory of planned behavior in entrepreneurship research: what we know and future directions (2015, background): “In addition to venture creation and new venture development intentions and behaviors, which have been described above, the intention to, and subsequent behavior of, recognizing opportunities (Ramos-Rodriguez et al. 2010), innovating (Montalvo 2006), leaving an entrepreneurial firm (Brigham, De Castr”
Risk management capability building in SMEs: A social capital perspective (2013, background): “A study of the role of social capital in opportunity recognition by Ramos-Rodríguez et al. (2010) shows that individual access to knowledge through social networks is fundamental for developing the capability to recognize new business opportunities.”