Founder Personalities, Behaviors and New Venture Success in Sub-Saharan Africa

• Published in: Technological forecasting & social change 2020-02, Vol.151, p.119766, Article 119766
• Main Authors: Rashid, Lubna, Alzafari, Khaled, Kratzer, Jan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: African Entrepreneurs; Big Five; Businesspeople; Entrepreneurial and Managerial Behaviors; Entrepreneurs; Entrepreneurship; Fragile States; Fragility; New business enterprises; Personality; Political factors; Start-up Success; Success
• ISSN: 0040-1625; 1873-5509
• DOI: 10.1016/j.techfore.2019.119766

•This article focuses on understanding how personality characteristics relate to entrepreneurial and managerial behaviors among sub Saharan African entrepreneurs.•The article employs linear regression modeling to assess the big five predictability of founder behavior and an independent sample t-test to assess behavior's predictability of entrepreneurial success.•Conscientiousness and agreeableness appear to be the strongest personality predictors of entrepreneurial success.•Country fragility plays a role in moderating the personality-entrepreneurial behavior relationship.•Customized, context-appropriate entrepreneurial support approaches are needed. Facing heightened levels of political instability and institutional fragility, several sub-Saharan African countries have been responding with innovation policies and entrepreneurship support structures. With little scholarly knowledge on who those entrepreneurs are at an individual level, however, the ability to effectively support innovative new ventures in some of the world's most compromised regions would remain limited. Based on a sample of 232 entrepreneurs, this study attempts to enlighten the relationship between personality characteristics of entrepreneurs and their behaviors and subsequent success. This study thereby extends the entrepreneurship literature applying the Five-Factor Model of Personality to a new context while enriching knowledge on the personality-behavior relationship in entrepreneurship. Several findings and theoretical concepts are synthesized while evaluating new venture success from a behavioral lens among largely innovative, social-driven entrepreneurs in sub-Saharan countries, providing important implications for research, policy, and practice.