How Can Decision Makers Foster Productive Entrepreneurship Communities?

Endeavor Insight completed one of the largest studies ever conducted on entrepreneurship communities. This research was funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in order to answer the following question: How can decision-makers empower local entrepreneurship communities to become more productive? A full copy of the report can be downloaded here.

This project is one of the first studies to use network analyses to assess the collective impact of founders, investors, support organizations, and other entrepreneurship actors. These analyses revealed five key lessons that are listed below.

Five Lessons on Productivity in Entrepreneurship Communities

  • Entrepreneurship communities are not predestined to follow a single development path. Entrepreneurship communities do not develop along the same linear path, and it is misleading to consider communities of different sizes and patterns as older or younger versions of each other. Instead, patterns of development are strongly shaped by the different approaches used by decision-makers working to support local entrepreneurs.

Patterns of influence like these are especially critical since influence in network systems tends to be relative and persistent over time. When leaders elevate the influence of specific types of actors in a local entrepreneurship community, they reduce the comparative influence of others. This can have long-term benefits or consequences — analyses of many different networks have shown that once an entity becomes a major influencer, or hub, in a network, it will almost always remain very influential.

Taken together, these lessons show that elevating the influence of leaders at entrepreneurial that have reached scale promotes productivity and development within an entrepreneurship community. Local decision-makers can empower these leaders to influence upcoming founders in a number of ways. These strategies, referred to as “Entrepreneur-Led Economic Development,” are discussed in depth in the report’s recommendations.

About Endeavor Insight

Endeavor Insight is the research division of Endeavor, a nonprofit organization with a 20-year history of supporting high-impact entrepreneurs around the world. Our team of economists, data scientists, and policy analysts provide data-backed insights on entrepreneurship and its contribution to economic development. We specialize in understanding how entrepreneurship networks can drive job creation and inclusive growth. We partner with organizations that support entrepreneurs, including foundations, multilateral agencies, and corporations.

--

--

Endeavor is the leading global community of, by, and for High-Impact Entrepreneurs — those who dream bigger, scale faster, and pay it forward.

Get the Medium app

A button that says 'Download on the App Store', and if clicked it will lead you to the iOS App store
A button that says 'Get it on, Google Play', and if clicked it will lead you to the Google Play store
Endeavor

Endeavor is the leading global community of, by, and for High-Impact Entrepreneurs — those who dream bigger, scale faster, and pay it forward.