University Ecosystems and the Commitment of Faculty Members to Support Entrepreneurial Activity.
| Autor | de Moraes, Gustavo Herminio Salati Marcondes |
Introduction
Over the last two decades, universities have seen a progressive inclusion of the third mission in their strategic orientation--in addition to teaching and research--with particular emphasis on innovation and economic development (Audretsch, 2007; Goldstein, 2010). The main goal behind this rationale is to further integrate academia and productive systems, making universities more economically engaged institutions (Etzkowitz & Leydesdorff, 2000; Rasmussen, Moen, & Gulbrandsen, 2006). In this regard, a key mode of technology transfer consists in the capacity of academia to generate spin offs with high innovative potential and the respective socioeconomic impacts that follow (Audretsch, Grilo, & Thurik, 2011; Bercovitz & Feldman, 2006; Ferreira, Fayolle, Fernandes, & Raposo, 2017). The university itself can be perceived as a natural incubator of these new ventures, provided it can offer an adequate atmosphere for students to explore and exploit new ideas (Kirby, Urbano, & Guerrero, 2011).
Following this perspective, many universities have established initiatives to foster ecosystems that are conducive to entrepreneurial activity in students and academics (Galan-Muros, Sijde, Groenewegen, & Baaken, 2017; Guerrero, Urbano, & Fayolle, 2016; Peterman & Kennedy, 2003). Accordingly, researchers have been dedicating attention to strategies that aim at positioning universities as entrepreneurial hubs (Gnyawali & Fogel, 1994; Siegel & Wright, 2015). Such strategic approaches are linked to the principles of corporate entrepreneurship (or intrapreneurship), in which the university stands for an organizational context with particular specificities (Brennan, Wall, & McGowan, 2005; Kirby, 2006; Liu & Dubinsky, 2000; Woollard, 2010).
An aspect of interest in this realm concerns the entrepreneurial ecosystems embedded in higher education institutions (Miller & Acs, 2017) and their respective relationship with corporate strategy (Braunerhjelm, 2007; Kirby, 2006; Woollard, 2010). Along these lines, Kalar and Antonic (2015) propose that the entrepreneurial university--and its respective corporate entrepreneurship strategy--requires fostering a culture of innovation that encourages individuals to pursue knowledge dissemination through new channels. In fact, matters associated with entrepreneurship-friendly cultures, policies, and practices lie at the heart of the concept of entrepreneurial universities (Bercovitz & Feldman, 2004; Clark, 1998; Huyghe & Knockaert, 2015; Kirby, 2006; Meyers & Pruthi, 2011; Siegel, Waldman, & Link, 2003). This perspective puts emphasis on intrapreneurship driving elements such as internal (organizational structure and support systems) and strategic (mission, vision, and reward systems) factors as a means to leverage capabilities in higher education institutions (Markuerkiaga, Errasti, & Igartua, 2014). Nonetheless, literature in the field has dedicated scant attention to such cultural aspects, a function of the difficulty in addressing informal settings--particularly from a quantitative point of view.
To help filling this gap, this research deviates from the traditional focus on the entrepreneurial event itself (i.e., new firm formation) to look into the contextual determinants of faculty engagement as a vector of corporate entrepreneurship in these processes. As Wadhwani, Galvez-Behar, Mercelis and Guagnini (2017) argue, the concept of academic entrepreneurship can have different meanings that go beyond the narrow focus on research commercialization. Accordingly, we look at faculty members as potential intrapreneurs, i.e., agents responsible for creating platforms that guide social change, enabling behavioral shifts in other individuals by modifying the underlying settings concerning entrepreneurial incentives (Chiles, Bluedorn, & Gupta, 2007; Clark, 1998; Gurau, Dana, & Lasch, 2012; Mars & Rios-Aguilar, 2010).
Bearing this context in mind, the goal of this research is to evaluate whether the university ecosystem influences the engagement of faculty in supporting entrepreneurial activities and education at the institutional level. This goal is in tandem with the idea that effective corporate entrepreneurship relies on the connection of high-level strategies at the organizational level with the implementation of a culture that fosters entrepreneurial commitment among academics and students (Ireland, Covin, & Kuratko, 2009; Kirby, 2006).
It is noteworthy that the literature on this topic has provided scant insights on (a) the antecedents of intrapreneurship in universities (Farrukh, Lee, & Shahzad, 2019) and on (b) the micro-foundations of universities' third mission regarding faculty members' engagement (Freel, Persaud, & Chamberlin, 2019). To cover this gap, we concentrate our attention on the connections between formal corporate initiatives of universities to develop functional entrepreneurial ecosystems and their impacts on faculty engagement with promoting an entrepreneurial culture within the institution. Ultimately, these relationships represent a relevant asset in triggering intrapreneurial behavior and a culture for entrepreneurship within universities' ecosystems.
Our empirical approach is based on data from 680 faculty members of 70 Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) located across 22 states in Brazil. The dataset was developed in 2016 by Endeavor and Brazilian Micro and Small Business Support Service (Servico Brasileiro de Apoio as Micro e Pequenas Empresas [Sebrae]) and made available to the authors for the purposes of this assessment. The Brazilian context makes for an interesting analytical case. On the one hand, universities in this country have sought adequate configurations to uphold entrepreneurship by implementing institutional mechanisms that lend support to the creation of new ventures and the education of entrepreneurs (Perlatto, 2013). Notwithstanding, the effectiveness of these initiatives in terms of new firm creation is disappointing (Alves, Fischer, Schaeffer, & Queiroz, 2019). Therefore, our comprehension of the dynamics of corporate entrepreneurship leading to entrepreneurial universities in Brazilian higher education institutions remains limited.
Results are derived from estimations using Structural Equation Modeling with Partial Least Squares (PLS-SEM). Findings indicate an association between universities' ecosystems and the commitment of faculty members to support entrepreneurial activity. Furthermore, the entrepreneurial experience of faculty moderates this relationship, in which the connection between universities' ecosystems and academics' commitment to entrepreneurship promotion is stronger in those professors who are more closely involved with entrepreneurship as a professional practice. Furthermore, no differences were found for the comparison between public and private institutions.
These outcomes represent novel evidence on the dynamics of entrepreneurial ecosystems of academic institutions and they suggest an association between formal practices and shifts in faculty behavior (an informal output of the process). Thus, our research contributes to the discussion on the formation of universities' ecosystems and the ways through which they might reinforce themselves over time by strengthening faculty engagement with the entrepreneurial event. From a theoretical point of view, the apparent inefficiency of corporate strategies in driving entrepreneurial activity in students may be due to inadequate timing of appraisals, since evolutionary processes that involve deeper changes--and have longer maturation periods--can be at play (a typical ecosystem feature).
The article is structured as follows. After these introductory arguments, second section articulates the literature on entrepreneurial universities, the role of faculty, and the relevance of institutional settings of universities' ecosystems. We also discuss additional perceptions on potential moderating effects of faculty entrepreneurial experience and differences between public and private institutions. From this literature, we derive our guiding hypotheses. Third section presents the conceptual model and the analytical method. Fourth section reports the empirical results, which are discussed in fifth section. Sixth section concludes with final remarks, implications, and avenues for future research.
Corporate Strategy and the Emergence of Entrepreneurial Universities
Although the concept of entrepreneurial universities has been coined in the 1980s (Etzkowitz, 1983), the underlying notion of closer approximation between academia and markets dates back to the nineteenth century. Since then, academics have been involved in activities that aim at translating research into technological development, generation of new business, as well as inspiring change in social and governmental practices (Wadhwani, Galvez-Behar, Mercelis, & Guagnini, 2017). Nonetheless, it was not until the last two decades that practices related to such activities became entrenched in the mentality of decision makers (Audretsch, 2007; Rubens, Spigarelli, Cavicchi, & Rinaldi, 2017).
In order for universities to match the organizational needs to adapt to this changing context, they must become more entrepreneurial themselves, thus fostering practices of intrapreneurship (Farrukh et al., 2019). Accordingly, prior literature suggests that the view of corporate entrepreneurship practices offers a suitable lens to address how a closer connection between higher education institutions and markets can be established (Vorley & Nelles, 2010). With this in mind, the entrepreneurial university concept should not be taken as given since it requires active engagement of academic institutions with this process.
In fact, most universities have not been involved with changes in organizational structure and governance, hindering their capacity of becoming effectively entrepreneurial (Dovey & Rembach, 2015). In order to turn the...
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