Editorial

The final issue of Volume 22 is written at a time of unprecedented economic and economic uncertainty in the UK due to the decision to exit the European Community. This decision has significant ramifications on the Higher Education sector in the UK due to the potential black hole in funding from loss of European monies and students. The ramifications of all these issues will no doubt play out in coming months. The Entrepreneurship community must not be afraid to offer opinion and inform the debate in all available media forums.

Overall, 2016 has been a positive year for IJEBR with 37 full papers published. The journal has been accepted into the Thomson Reuters Emerging Sources Citation Index which is a significant step forward. The journal is currently reviewing its position in the various national journal ranking systems with a view to requesting upgrade. For example, a submission was made to the Association of Business Schools with a request to be considered for an upgrade although we will not receive the outcome of this until 2018. IJEBR remains extremely ambitious with a view to develop both its national and international reputation. Looking forward, 2017 has the potential to be an exciting year for the journal with a number of special issues coming to fruition. Emerald has also allowed us to expand our paper allocation to 44 papers for 2017. As Editor-in-Chief I welcome this move and look forward to the further growth of the journal in coming years.

IJEBR is currently promoting three special issue calls www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com/products/journals/journals.htm?id=ijebr respectively, exploring organisational resilience, entrepreneurial cognition and social entrepreneurship. We invite readers to submit contributions for these issues, as well as regular issues. Please contact the respective guest editors in each case if you wish to make an enquiry. All relevant details are on the website.

The study by Annink, Den Dulk and Amorós considers the effects of self-employed work characteristics (consumer orientation, innovativeness, number of employees, motivation and entrepreneurial phase) on work-life balance satisfaction using the Global Entrepreneurship Dataset (2013). The results of this study reveal that there is a negative relation between being exposed to excessive stress and running a consumer-oriented business and work-life balance. The ease of doing business in a country was positively related to the work-life balance of self-employed workers.

The study by Williams-Middleton, Lackéus and Lundqvist use entrepreneurship to bridge the traditional – progressive education rift. The rift between traditional and progressive education is deconstructed into five dualisms. Conceptual question-based analysis is then applied to determine if and how three entrepreneurial tools could contribute to bridging this rift; effectuation, customer development and appreciative enquiry. Finally, pattern-based generalisations are drawn from this analysis. Patterns in the analysis motivate the articulation of an overarching educational philosophy learning through creating value for others grounded in entrepreneurship and capable of bridging the educational rift. The new educational philosophy has been shown to be capable of bridging five dualisms in education which are currently problematic for teachers in their daily practice, and to remedy teacher challenges such as complexity, lack of resources, assessment difficulties and student disengagement. Contrasting existent educational philosophies, this new philosophy goes beyond learning through to also emphasise creating value for others. This could facilitate bridging between traditional and progressive education, one of the most important challenges in education. It could also be used to facilitate the infusion of entrepreneurship into general education.

Eijdenberg’s study investigates the impact of entrepreneurial motivation and entrepreneurial orientation in Tanzania’s informal economy. The development of personal wealth is used to measure the performance of subsistence entrepreneurs in the Mama Lishe sector. Using a factor analysis, a distinction is made between the development of basic personal wealth and the development of advanced personal wealth. The study found entrepreneurial motivation and entrepreneurial orientation, as constructed by studies in Western countries, have little effect on both forms of personal wealth. Instead, the owner’s age, as an indicator of entrepreneurial experience, is a relatively strong predictor for the development of personal wealth.

Landini papers investigates the impact of a prolonged economic recession on the entrepreneurial intentions of young people (3,684 university students) distinguishing between propensity to start a new business (i.e. degree of interest in entrepreneurship) and perceived likelihood of becoming an entrepreneur (i.e. probability to start a business in the future). The study verifies if the recession strengthens the orientation to exploit new market opportunities, or simply supports self-employment objectives. This study found that while the perception of the economic crisis as an obstacle to new business creation does not impact on the propensity towards entrepreneurship, it has a negative and highly significant impact on the likelihood to start a business. Secondly, when a distinction is made between opportunity- and necessity-based types, results show that while for the latter the crisis impacts only on the perceived likelihood to become an entrepreneur, for the former it affects both dimensions of entrepreneurship, i.e., both propensity and perceived likelihood. Moreover, neither family support nor economic institutions are perceived as relevant in sustaining entrepreneurial intentions. On the contrary, the university is considered as a key support entity.

The fifth paper by Evangelista and Mac determines the relative importance of deliberate learning, learning from experience and relevant learning co-varieties in pursuing market learning, and to assess the impact of market learning on export performance in smaller firms. The results suggest that among SMEs, deliberate learning has a greater impact on export market learning as compared to experience accumulation, and that market learning has a significant effect on export performance. The results also demonstrate that absorptive capacity and commitment to learning are significant co-varieties of market learning.

On a personal level, I would like to acknowledge the considerable contribution and efforts of the editorial team, namely, the co-editors Dr Martina Battisti, Professor Lois Shelton, Dr Richard Tunstall and Dr Claire Seamen, the Book Review Editor. Moreover, my sincere gratitude to Annie Simmons (Managing Editor) for her considerable contribution to the journal in this and previous years. Annie has now moved onto a new role within the Emerald group and will no doubt be a great success. I would also like to welcome Helen Alexander as our new Publisher. Helen has already made a significant impact and is seeking to drive forward the development of the journal. IJEBR continues to play a key role focusing on publishing original research related to the human and social dynamics of entrepreneurship, and entrepreneurial management in small and growing organisations, at an international level.

In conclusion, we thank all the authors and reviewers for their efforts in developing these studies to a satisfactory outcome. I thank members of both the Editorial Advisory Board and Editorial Review Board in promoting and developing the journal. Please do not hesitate to contact me or other members of the editorial team if you feel you can contribute to the further development of the journal.