.

Abstract:

The literature, research findings and anecdotal evidence relating to the personal development and managerial progression of females within organisations suggests the presence of significant barriers (i.e. ‘the glass ceiling’) preventing comparative level of achievements to their male counterparts. Whilst such evidence has been accumulated about intrapreneurship in the larger organisation, fewer studies have addressed the issue of entrepreneurship in the smaller organisation. One might speculate that the ownership and management of your own business frees you from many of the encumbrances, barriers and prejudices encountered in the intrapreneurial role. The assumption would then be that gender-related differences are not significant within the entrepreneurial role in the SME sector and the problems encountered are not gender-specific but rather related to the risks associated with new business development and growth. A primary aim of the research study was designed to evaluate this proposition. An alternative proposition suggests that whilst the entrepreneur may enjoy degrees of freedom in decision making within their organisation a number of contextual factors, both internal and external, may impose gender-related barriers and constraints to the effectiveness of this decision making ability. A further aim, therefore, was intended to explore the internal and external factors, which constrain the decision-making of the entrepreneurs in the smaller business, and specifically to identify those that may be more gender-related. The study was interested not only in those factors, which provided a deterrent to the initiation of the business in the first instance, but those that continued to influence the effectiveness and efficiency of the developing business. For example, the relationships with other members of the supply chain financial institutions and union representatives were all features explored in the research.

The paper reports the findings of this empirical study into the personal characteristics and contextual factors that influence both the opportunities available for females to undertake the creation and subsequent successful development of SMEs. The specific factors addressed as part of the research incorporate:

1. Contextual factors that encourage/deter female entrepreneurship in relation to the initiation of a new business opportunity and its subsequent development.

2. Personal characteristics relating to educational and socio/economic background, age, dependents etc.


3. Motivational characteristics including financial rewards; career-break; redundancy; newly acquired qualifications; role models; personal self-esteem; glass-ceiling, redundancy.
4. Assessment of gender-related attitudes towards risk and uncertainty and their potential influence on risk taking behaviour.

5. Development of an initial typology relating personal motivations to the degree of entrepreneurship/intrapreneurship experienced.

6. Determination of the support mechanisms needed to facilitate and encourage female engagement and success in entrepreneurship.

The primary approach adopted in the study was designed to investigate these key research issues through a more qualitative methodology targeted at the owner/managers of a small number of SMEs. Initially, a wider evaluation was conducted across a large sample of practising managers to determine what they considered to be the attributes of entrepreneurship and to provide a benchmark for the profiling of the risk perceptiveness/responsiveness of the entrepreneurs in the main study. A group of 10 male and 10 female entrepreneurs were included in the main study which encompassed three distinct stages, a self administered risk perception questionnaire, an in-depth interview and a focus group to develop initial responses from the previous stages.

Recommendations are provided for developing this research both within the entrepreneurial role in the SME and the entrapreneurial role within the larger organisation. Proposals are also included to widen the basis of the discriminatory definition to incorporate ethnicity and age as part of an extended research programme.