Please use this form to submit your study for inclusion into our database. It will be checked by a member of the Innovation Growth Lab team, who may be in contact to ask for more information. Your email address * Your name * Title * The name of the study Short summary Prior research suggests that firms in entrepreneurial settings benefit from a scientific approach to decision making that combines cognitive and evidence-based components. But to what extent and under what conditions is the scientific approach to decision-making associated with superior performance? A brief description of the project's goals and its current state Abstract <p>Based on a field experiment with 261 entrepreneurs, this study abductively investigates how a firm’s degree of business development –the extent to which its strategic choices are crystallized—moderates the impact of a scientific approach to decision-making on performance. Treated firms learn to apply a scientific approach, while control firms receive comparable content without the scientific approach. A scientific approach prompts entrepreneurs at a higher degree of development to fine-tune their already delineated strategies. Instead, it leads entrepreneurs at a lower degree of development to reevaluate core aspects of their strategy. Consequently, treated firms with a high degree of development outperform control firms, while treated firms with a low degree of development experience more uncertainty and less favorable short-term economic outcomes than control firms.</p> The full abstract of the study, if available Links http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3894831 Links to any published papers and related discussions Authors * Affiliations Academic and other institutes that the authors of the study are members of Delivery partner Organisations involved in delivering the trial, if appropriate Year Year Year199419951996199719981999200020012002200320042005200620072008200920102011201220132014201520162017201820192020202120222023202420252026 Month MonthJanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec Day Day12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031 Journal Journal publishing the study, if available Publication stage * Working Paper Published Ongoing Research Forthcoming Discussion Paper Research theme * Entrepreneurship Innovation Business Growth Country Country or countries where this study took place. Topics What sort of topics does the study cover? Sample attributes Hypotheses / research question To which extent do managerial approaches impact firm performance? Sample Trial population and sample selection Entrepreneurial firms with less than 10 employees and at varied levels of business development. Participant firms operate in a wide range of sectors, from software to retail, and on average have existed for slightly less than three years. On average, firms have two members of the firm participating in the training as a team. About 46% of participants are women, average age is 36 years old and team members dedicate an average of 30 hours a week to the business. A third have a STEM background and a sixth an economics background. Number of treatment groups Size of treatment groups Size of control group Unit of analysis Clustered? Yes No Cluster details Trial attributes Treatment description Half of the participants are trained on how to apply the tools taught during the training sessions using a scientific approach. That is, to explicitly formulate theories about their business models, break them down into separate hypotheses and collect adequate data to test their validity. The other half are left to follow their own intuitions to decide how to better apply the tools taught through the training. Rounds of data collection Baseline data collection and method All applicants were required to complete an extensive survey and participate in a 30- minute call with a member of the data collection team which aimed at collecting baseline information on their business and their approach to decision making prior to the intervention. Data collection method and data collected Evaluation Outcome variables <p>Firm’s decision making process, key changes in the firm in terms of value proposition and performance.</p> Results <p>Firms receiving the scientific approach version of the training are more likely to terminate all activities related to their business within the nine months following the start of the training. Being taught the scientific approach to decision making makes firms more likely to pivot only once, as opposed to not pivoting or pivoting several times.Adding the scientific approach component to the training does not have an effect on revenue, costs and value added for participant firms within the eight months after the training, on average. However, the training raises the revenue, costs and value added of firms that were already more established to start with (USD 27,000, USD 23,000 and USD 3,000 respectively for a firm with an initial annual revenue of about USD 83,000). Entrepreneurs at a more advanced stage of development pivot more but engage in less radical pivots - changes to the value proposition or customer segment. This suggests that more established businesses benefit more from the scientific approach training given that they are able to apply it in a more focused and contextualised way. The scientific approach leads to increases in employment for firms at all developmental stages within the first eight months, leaving open the possibility of further effects on business performance showing beyond the observation window.</p> Intervention costs Not available. Cost benefit ratio Reference Novelli, E., & Spina, C. , 2021. When do Entrepreneurs Benefit from Acting Like Scientists? A Field Experiment in the UK. Citation for use in academic references
