 Small business in a time of crisis: A five stage model of business griefSimon Stephens, Christopher McLaughlin and Katrina McLaughlin Journal of Business Venturing Insights, 2021, vol. 16, issue C Abstract: In this paper we examine the implications that a crisis such as that created by COVID-19 has for the psychological well-being of small business owners. We use the psychological literature on grief, specifically, the Kübler-Ross (1969) Five Stage Model of Grief to examine the impacts. Our review of the literature indicates that although there are critics of a stage based approach there are also advocates for the use of stages to help us frame and understand the manifestations of grief. Data was collected from forty small business owners based in Ireland. Data was collected five times over a period of six months (March–September 2020). The outcome is a five-stage model of business grief. The findings provide insights into the emotional relationship between an owner and their small business. We propose that a business closure can cause small business owners to grieve in a manner that aligns with a series of stages and that these stages can be modelled and illustrated. Keywords: Business crisis; Kübler-Ross; Business grief; COVID-19 (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jobuve:v:16:y:2021:i:c:s2352673421000603 DOI: 10.1016/j.jbvi.2021.e00282 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Business Venturing Insights is currently edited by Dimo Dimov More articles in Journal of Business Venturing Insights from Elsevier |
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