This study presents an original empirically based conceptual framework representing mobile microbusiness founders' experiences when converting to a franchise business model that links individual-level variables to a sociomaterial process.
An exploratory interpretive research design produced this framework using data from the enterprise development narratives of mobile franchisors who had recently converted their mobile microbusinesses to a franchise business model.
The emergent framework proposes that franchisor’s conversion experience involves substantial identity work prompted by an identity dilemma originating in a conflict between role expectations and franchising operational demands. This dilemma materializes during franchise document creation and requires some degree of “identity undoing” to ensure business continuity. By acting as boundary-objects-in-use in the conversion process, the franchise documents provide a sociomaterial foundation for the business transition and the development of a viable franchisor identity.
There is scant literature addressing the startup experiences of mobile microbusiness franchisors. The study was therefore exploratory, producing a substantive conceptual framework that will require further confirmatory studies.
By proposing that conversion to a franchise business model is experienced as an identity transformation coupled to a sociomaterial process centred on system documentation, this original empirically based conceptual framework not only addresses a gap in the individual-level literature on franchise development but also provides a framework to direct new research and discussions between intending franchisors and their professional advisors about person–enterprise fit.
The conceptual framework is the first to address franchisors' experience of transitioning any type of microbusiness to a franchise business model.
