Are work stressors and emotional exhaustion driving exit intentions among business owners?

A qualitative study of factors that managers in small companies consider important for their wellbeing

PURPOSE

Given the importance of small businesses for society, and the significance of managers' wellbeing for employee health, leadership, and business performance, more knowledge is needed on the sources of managers' wellbeing. This study explored factors within the small business context that were perceived by managers to hinder or enable their wellbeing.

METHODS

Data were collected through qualitative semi-structured interviews with 20 managers from 12 small companies, and analysed with content analysis.

RESULTS

The factors that these managers in small businesses experienced as enhancing or hindering their personal wellbeing covered five categories: demands and resources in the daily managerial work, achievement of results, social factors, organizational factors, and individual factors.

CONCLUSIONS

The specific context of managerial work in small companies encompasses unique factors. For instance, the small company managers' wellbeing was affected by vulnerability due to the smallness of the business and the absence of available resources. Simultaneously, a small company context provided a strong social climate and close relationships with employees and customers that strengthened the managers' wellbeing. The findings suggest that the availability of financial, personnel, and organizational resources varies between small companies of different size, which may have implications for small business managers' work and wellbeing.

Family- and non-family-related reasons for entrepreneurial exits

Purpose

This study examines the family- and non-family-related reasons that may determine the choice of the anticipated entrepreneurial exit strategy (exit intention).

Design/methodology/approach

The study is based on a survey of 267 owner-managers of micro-and small-sized firms in Poland and focuses on their exit intentions (rather than actual actions) as precursors to entrepreneurial exit. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to test the hypotheses.

Findings

The results show that family-related reasons may encourage entrepreneurs to choose the stewardship strategy over the financial harvest or voluntary cessation strategies, while non-family-related reasons such as maintaining financial independence and health may encourage the choice of the financial harvest or the voluntary cessation strategy.

Originality/value

This research contributes to both the entrepreneurial exit literature and psychological ownership theory by demonstrating the potential relevance of psychological ownership in the selection of exit strategies.

Is It so Severe for Social Entrepreneurship in a Transitional Economy? The Role of Work-Related Wellbeing and Political Connection in Shaping the Exit Intention

In the context of a transitional economy, there are much more studies with a heroic characterization of social entrepreneurs, whereas there is limited exploration of their less positive stories. A range of studies tried to address this issue, although very few delved into the “inner layer” (work-related mental health) to unveil the mechanism of how social entrepreneurs develop their intention to quit their businesses. With a sample of 196 social business owners from China, this research focuses on the prosocial motivation of social entrepreneurs as well as its impacts on their work-related wellbeing and thus their business exit intention. With the partial least squares structural equation modeling, this research finds that prosocial motivation decreased entrepreneurs' partial work-related wellbeing, increasing their exit intention, and the mediating effects among the three components of work-related wellbeing were different. Furthermore, this research finds that work-related wellbeing's impact on exit intention was largely stronger for the social entrepreneurs without political connections.

More Prosocial, More Ephemeral? The Role of Work-Related Wellbeing and Gender in Incubating Social Entrepreneurs' Exit Intention

Why does social entrepreneurship tend to live so shortly? A range of studies tried to answer this question, although very few delved into the “inner layer” (psychological status) to unveil how social entrepreneurs decide to quit. Accordingly, focusing on prosocial motivation of social entrepreneurs and its impact on their work-related wellbeing and then their business exit intention, we conducted this empirical research. Furthermore, gender differences are involved based on relevant calls for in-depth investigation. With a sample of 301 respondents in China, deploying the partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM), we found prosocial motivation decreases entrepreneurs’ work-related wellbeing, which in turn, increases entrepreneurial exit intention. Furthermore, adopting the multi-group analysis (MGA) technique, we uncovered that the impact of prosocial motivation on work-related wellbeing largely is stronger for males. Our research thus contributes to the growing research and knowledge on social entrepreneurship in terms of individual personality traits and how they impact a social entrepreneur’s psychological status and thus their intention of exiting the social business. This study’s further theoretical and practical implications, as well as its limitations and thus future research directions, are discussed at the end.

The Impact of Self-Management Practices on Entrepreneurial Psychological States

It is well-known that entrepreneurs lead extremely busy lives. While research literature reports the stressors of entrepreneurial careers, few empirical studies have examined the actual management of the demands that entrepreneurs face in their daily lives. In this paper, we conducted a study of 472 small business owners and tested hypotheses on the roles of three self-management practices—exercise, work overload, and attention to detail—on stress, security, and job satisfaction. Exercise, work overload, and attention to detail serve as three important self-management practices that are largely under the decision-making of the individual entrepreneur.