Laetitia Gabay-Mariani

Composition of the Jury

Abstract

In recent years, calls for entrepreneurship have become increasingly common in media discourse, prompting public authorities to actively promote and support entrepreneurship, particularly among young people. Despite the proliferation of public and private initiatives in this direction, the transition to entrepreneurship remains challenging, with only 5% of the French population involved in business creation activities (GEM, 2018–2019). And even when steps are actually taken to launch a new business, this in no way guarantees the project’s continuation or future success. There is therefore a need to better understand what can encourage, reinforce, and influence the trajectories of nascent entrepreneurs.
This line of inquiry aligns with recent calls in the entrepreneurial literature to investigate the transition from intention to entrepreneurial action, in order to better understand the so-called volitional phase of the entrepreneurial process, particularly the self-regulatory mechanisms at play there. This doctoral dissertation builds on these efforts by examining the role of the nascent entrepreneur’s commitment profile in this crucial phase of the entrepreneurial process. It proposes to operationalize the organizational commitment model developed by Allen and Meyer (1990)—distinguishing between affective, normative, and calculated commitment—within the context of nascent entrepreneurship. It examines the forms that commitment can take in this specific context of creation and emergence, the factors that foster their development, and their consequences in terms of investment behavior (personal resources, overinvestment).
The research protocol underlying this thesis combines qualitative surveys—including interviews and focus groups—with three quantitative surveys using questionnaires administered to populations of nascent entrepreneurs from the Pépite France Chair’s Impact Observatory. This approach enabled the testing and validation of two new measurement scales: a two-dimensional scale of entrepreneurial commitment (affective and instrumental) and a scale of seven “side-bets” inspired by the work of Howard Becker (1960). In this regard, this work challenges the classic three-dimensional factor structure of commitment models and highlights the specific characteristics of the entrepreneurial context, as compared to the organizational context in which most of these models were developed. It also identified the factors—individual, social, and resource-related—and the behavioral consequences of the various forms of entrepreneurial commitment. Finally, it led to the development of a taxonomy distinguishing three commitment profiles among nascent entrepreneurs: the weakly committed, the emotionally committed, and the fully committed. This taxonomy proved to be a discriminating factor regarding the levels of progress and investment among nascent entrepreneurs from each group.
The results of this study support the thesis that a nascent entrepreneur’s commitment profile plays a crucial role in how the entrepreneurial process is initiated, pursued, and brought to completion. They refine our understanding of how nascent entrepreneurs may feel connected not only to their project but also to the broader process through which they become entrepreneurs. As such, they are of interest to public authorities and support professionals seeking to strengthen entrepreneurial careers, particularly among students and recent graduates.

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