Developing the Social Aspects of the Venture: Prosocial Motivation, Pathways of Compassion, and Hybridity

Dean A. Shepherd () and Holger Patzelt ()
Additional contact information
Dean A. Shepherd: University of Notre Dame, Mendoza College of Business
Holger Patzelt: Technical University of Munich, School of Management

Chapter 9 in The Entrepreneurial Compass, 2026, pp 67-73 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract Social impact is driven by prosocial motivation to alleviate suffering through two primary pathways: sustaining ventures (providing basic survival needs) and transforming ventures (restoring autonomy and self-reliance). These initiatives typically function as hybrid organizations, balancing social welfare and commercial logics. The authors introduce hybrid intensity and hybrid relativity as key dimensions of this balance. The chapter addresses the greed paradox, in which a founding team’s greed can lead to unethical pro-organizational behavior if not tempered by trust. Scaling requires political resourcefulness, employing practices such as protective, assertive, and dialogic resourcing to shield the mission from dominant participatory partners. However, persistent effort can lead to social-venturing fatigue, manifesting as detachment from and desensitization to beneficiaries. To sustain the mission, entrepreneurs must manage target feedback loops and maintain an authentic connection to the team, transforming temporary responses into enduring organizations that restore community self-reliance.

Keywords: Compassion Venturing; Hybrid Organizations; Political Resourcefulness; Prosocial Motivation; Social-venturing Fatigue; Sustaining Ventures; Transforming Ventures (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-032-36429-6_9

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/9783032364296

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-032-36429-6_9

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Springer Books from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().