After the harvest: A stewardship perspective on entrepreneurship and philanthropy

Blake D. Mathias, Shelby J. Solomon and Kristen Madison

Journal of Business Venturing, 2017, vol. 32, issue 4, 385-404

Abstract: Entrepreneurs comprise the majority of the richest people in the world. Their venture exits, or more specifically harvests, often represent the events through which they accrue this great wealth. Following these harvests, entrepreneurs make critical decisions with their financial resources that can have a profound impact on society. Through content analysis of The Giving Pledge letters and in-depth interviews with entrepreneurs, we explore how and why entrepreneurs redistribute their resources following harvests, and we reveal four mechanisms — intrinsic motivation, identification, personal power, and stewardship norms — that drive these philanthropic decisions. We extend stewardship theory and highlight a new avenue through which entrepreneurs can act as stewards of others and address societal concerns.

Keywords: Qualitative research; Venture exit; Harvest; Philanthropy; Stewardship theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0883902617302483
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

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:eee:jbvent:v:32:y:2017:i:4:p:385-404

DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2017.04.001

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Business Venturing is currently edited by S. Venkataraman

More articles in Journal of Business Venturing from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().