Spirituality and entrepreneurial failure
Files
Date
Authors
Supervisor
Item type
Degree name
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
The paper examines how spirituality affected entrepreneurs’ experience of venture failure and its aftermath. Failure is an important but under-researched part of the entrepreneurial process. We implement a qualitative, narrative research design and present a collective story of nine spiritually oriented entrepreneurs’ experience of failure. Overall, the paper extends research beyond the current psychological focus to a spiritual perspective. Findings show that entrepreneurs’ experience of failure was different from that predicted by psychological theories. Entrepreneurs deeply engaged with failure instead of indulging in self-deception and other cognitive strategies to cope with the negative emotions of failure. Furthermore, findings revealed a rare, unexpected positive outcome from failure – entrepreneurs evolved spiritually through experiencing this negative life event.