Locus of Control and The Happy Entrepreneur

2004

In the management literature, the locus-of-control concept has been applied extensively over the past three decades. This research note reports the results of a panel data study among a representative sample of 6,111 US young citizens who have been interviewed on a regular basis over a period of about two decades. In addition to this, various relevant personality traits and parental background characteristics have been administered before the first wave and before these young people started working. By analyzing this panel dataset, we offer three contributions to the locus-ofcontrol literature. First, we test for the robustness of the locus-of-control effect on individual performance (in terms of hourly earnings) in the context of this impressive panel data context.

2020

Internal locus of control is one of the factors that has contributed to the entrepreneurial intentions of vocational high school students. This study aims to reveal empirically the relationship between internal locus of control and entrepreneurial intentions of vocational high school students. The population in this study were all 422 grade XII students of Vocational High School in the field of technology and engineering expertise in the City of Jombang. The sample used was 180 students through random techniques. The data was collected using the entrepreneurial intention scale and the internal locus of control scale. The data analysis technique uses the product moment correlation analysis technique. The results showed a significant positive relationship between internal locus of control and entrepreneurial intention, with a significance level (p) of 0.032. The internal locus of control correlation coefficient is 0.513 for entrepreneurial intentions. It can be concluded from this stu...

Frontiers in Psychology, 2023

This research aims to assess the influence of locus of control on the expression of entrepreneurial competency in a small business setting. Specifically, it predicts how this can generate positive outcomes in terms of business growth, quality of life, and sustainable entrepreneurial intention. Survey responses were collected from 102 small-sized firms in Malaysia. Structural equation modeling was performed to validate a mediation model and test nine research hypotheses. The results suggested that internal locus of control indirectly affects the venturing outcomes via entrepreneurial competency, whereas external locus of control has no such consequences. Thus, it can be deduced that beliefs based on internal attributions-rather than external forces, define entrepreneurs' destiny, and their competencies serve a perpetual role in linking these beliefs to positive business performance, life satisfaction, and sustainable entrepreneurial behavior. In practical terms, policymakers may gradually shift their focus from supplying direct financial relief assistance to the owner-managers to empowering them with core competencies building programs, especially during disasters and recessions. This study unravels the complexities of the entrepreneurial psychology-competency interface and fills a gap in the literature by providing compelling evidence of the adverse consequences of relying too heavily on fate or external assistance.

8th ERAZ Selected Papers (part of ERAZ conference collection)

A country’s economic growth and development are closely linked to entrepreneurship and innovation, which is why entrepreneurs are recognized as one of the key drivers of the economy. Moreover, job creation, employment and innovation of products and services not only affect the na­tional economy but also the global economy. Having that in mind, it is com­prehensible why the ability to understand and predict entrepreneurial in­tention (EI) turned into a central category that is widely researched in the literature. The main goal of this PRISMA-guided systematic literature review is to iden­tify, present and qualitatively analyse relevant papers regarding entrepre­neurial intention, personality traits and especially the internal locus of con­trol. Moreover, other goals are to highlight the importance and influence of personality traits and the internal locus of control on entrepreneurial inten­tions and to present the findings regarding the interrelatedness of entrepre­neurial intention...

Journal of Education and Learning (EduLearn), 2020

Internal locus of control is one of the factors related to vocational high school students' entrepreneurial intention. This study aimed to empirically test the relationship between internal locus of control and entrepreneurial intention on vocational high school students. The population in this study was all students of class XII at Vocational High School 5 Yogyakarta as many as 392 students and research participants in total was 171 students. The sampling technique used was cluster random sampling. Data collection was conducted by using the scale of entrepreneurial intention and internal locus of control scale. Data analysis was done using product moment analysis technique. The results of data analysis showed a significant positive relationship between internal locus of control with entrepreneurial intention, with a significance level (p) of 0.030. Internal locus of control contributed 2.1 percent to entrepreneurial intention so that the remaining 97.9 percent was influenced by other variables. It could be concluded from this study that students' internal locus of control can predict student's entrepreneurship intention.

Journal of Management Development

PurposeThe management of employee happiness and well-being has been gaining interest in academic research in recent years; however, few studies have focussed on the entrepreneur's perspective. The aim of this paper is to analyse the state of research on women-led businesses, well-being and happiness management.Design/methodology/approachA bibliometric study has been carried out since 1996, the first year in which publications in this field were detected. In total, 128 papers are identified in the most reliable database, Web of Science Core Collection. A network mapping of authorship, citation and co-occurrence of keywords in scientific publications is shown.FindingsThe results of this study confirm that societal changes resulting from crises increase research interest in improving organisational environments and happiness. After the economic crises of 2013, there was a boost, and after the pandemic, there is again a boost in research. More than half of the publications and citat...

Journal of Business Research, 2019

The ability of individuals to recognize entrepreneurial opportunities is the decisive factor in their decision to pursue entrepreneurship as a career. Hence, the purpose of this study is to investigate the role of locus of control on opportunity recognition (OR) among aspiring entrepreneurs. With a two-wave survey data of 270 aspiring entrepreneurs, our results suggest that internal and external locus of control have positive and negative relationships with aspiring entrepreneurs' OR, respectively. The findings also show that entrepreneurial intention mediates the positive and negative relationships of internal and external locus of control on OR. Entrepreneurial searching self-efficacy (ESSE) provides an interesting moderating effect. The study sheds light on an important but rarely explored research area: OR among aspiring entrepreneurs. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Applied Research in Quality of Life, 2022

This paper studies the anatomy of entrepreneurs' satisfaction with life, which refers to the relationship between life satisfaction, satisfaction in domains of life, and affective, evaluative, and sensory experiences of being well. The paper focuses on owner-manager entrepreneurs, who, as managers, lead their firms and take major business decisions and, as owners, have room to deviate from the exclusive procurement of profits to pursue their happiness. The study of entrepreneurs' anatomy of life satisfaction provides insight on how they lead their firms and how they weight the well-being repercussions of their business decisions. The paper distinguishes between family-firm and nonfamily-firm entrepreneurs, and it shows that there is heterogeneity in entrepreneurs' anatomy of life satisfaction; with the life satisfaction of family-firm entrepreneurs being strongly driven by family satisfaction and by negative affect, while the life satisfaction of nonfamily-firm entrepreneurs is strongly driven by work satisfaction. These differences in the anatomy of entrepreneurs' life satisfaction do correspond with observed differences in the organization and behavior of family and nonfamily firms, which suggests that the anatomy of life satisfaction provides insight on how entrepreneurs weight their business decisions and lead their firms. The empirical exercise is based on an original survey applied to Spanish entrepreneurs in 2019.

Jurnal Dinamika Manajemen

This study tried to analyze the factors that influence the happiness level of entrepreneurs in Indonesia especially the nascent entrepreneurs. The level of entrepreneurs’ happiness has a positive effect on the sustainability of their business. The research data are secondary data from 1,148 respondents who are included in the category of Total Early-stage Entrepreneurial Activity (TEA) at Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) in 2013. The variables employed are motivation, perception and innovation and demographic variables (gender, education and income). Analyzer used is multiple linear regressions with dummy variable. From the result, it is found that only the motivation, education level and level of income that significantly influence the level of happiness. The nascent entrepreneurs, who have motivation to start a business because of opportunity, have a higher level of happiness than necessity motivation due to necessity. The level of education and income are also proportional ...

2019

More than 300 million people are estimated to be living with depression (World Health Organization, 2017). Several fields of studies can address the problem: being a mental issue, the field of psychology can contribute to the research; or medicine, as chronic depression can be pharmaceutically addressed. Confirmed to be the leading cause of work incapacity (World Health Organization, 2017), depression is a serious, current issue, with increasing repercussions in the future for organizations, industries, and economies worldwide. Additionally, "the new millennium goal is to be happy at work", and it's popularity infers that "it is very likely that there exists profound sadness at work" (Moccia, 2016, p. 144). Unhappiness at work is not merely a drain for the employee, but a significant cost for organizations in areas of: customer relations, staff retention, turnover, performance, and efficiency, to name a few (Blau and Boal 2016; Adler et al. 2006). The impact is such that it is deemed a robust strategy for competitive advantage that is difficult for competitors to copy (Haughey 1997; Achor 2010; Barney 1991; Nienaber and Martins 2014). Job performance of even the clinically improved patients having had suffered from depression remains consistency worse than control groups (D. A. Adler et al., 2006

Journal of Small Business & Entrepreneurship, 2018

This paper applies self-determination theory (SDT) and psychological capital literature to examine the impact of psychological capital and autonomy on a number of entrepreneurial outcomes including entrepreneurs' income, satisfaction, meaning in life, and commitment to the entrepreneurial career path. The results from two studies reported in this paper support the proposition that a positive mindset (consisting of psychological resources) and a feeling of autonomy are essential for entrepreneurial success. We also found that entrepreneurs' satisfaction mediates the effects of psychological capital, autonomy, as well as their interaction effects on commitment. In addition, the effects of psychological capital and autonomy on satisfaction were also moderated by level of income. The results have implications for entrepreneurship training and support interventions. The implications for research are also discussed.

Journal of Happiness Studies, 2012

This study empirically investigates factors influencing satisfaction levels of founders of new ventures, using a representative sample of 1,107 Dutch founders. We relate entrepreneurial satisfaction (with income, psychological burden and leisure time) to firm performance, motivation and human capital. Founders with high levels of specific human capital are more satisfied with income than those with high levels of general human capital. Intrinsic motivation and that of combining responsibilities lowers stress and leads to more satisfaction with leisure time. Women are more satisfied with their income than men, even though they have a lower average monthly turnover. Keywords Satisfaction Á Entrepreneurs Á Performance Á Motivation JEL Classification J28 Á L26 Á M13 1 Introduction The majority of entrepreneurs prefer to manage a venture that is successful and that provides them with sufficient financial means to live a comfortable life. For many aspiring entrepreneurs the reality does not meet their initial expectations. In fact, failure rates among start-ups and new ventures can amount up to sixty percent within the first 5 years (Cooper et al. 1988; Phillips and Kirchoff 1989) and the average income of the selfemployed is often well below that of comparable employed individuals (Hamilton 2000). We are grateful to both referees who helped us to improve our analysis.

Introduction For the most part, personalities in the workplace play a significant role. Spector (1982, p. 482) notes that 'major theories in organisational psychology assume that the same basic processes account for behaviour across all individuals and that situational characteristics cause predictable behaviour across all individuals'. Youssef and Luthans (2009) note that traits and trait-like characteristics have been consistently shown to have a significant relationship to work-related outcomes. Moreover, psychological states of psychological capital (PsyCap), such as self-efficacy, hope, optimism and resilience, have been found to be a baseline for development and create a causal relationship with traits. This has implications for utilising traits as a predictor of positive work states, which can be further developed to improve organisational effectiveness. In addition, this study demonstrated the usefulness of work locus of control (WLOC) as a trait in predicting the positive psychological state of PsyCap amongst middle managers in the recruitment industry of South Africa. Hence, understanding of the trait versus the state approach in relation to enhancing positivity in the workplace can ensure that individuals' working lives are more fulfilling. Based on these statements the current study adopted a strength-based outlook in examining work. It is also further noted that the South African recruitment industry is a unique industry, facing its own set of challenges. The recruitment process itself is directed by people who need to understand the cross-cultural issues and applicability of legislations such as Affirmative Action policies, the Labour Legislations Act (No. 66 of 1995), based on South Africa's view of human dignity, and the Employment Equity Act (No. 55 of 1998), amongst others. These influence the industry to adopt practices that present unique challenges, and the applicability and understanding of the trait versus the state approach in enhancing work performance within the recruitment industry Orientation: The role of traits as a determinant of states has resulted in researchers closely examining their potential for enhancing work behaviour. This is achieved through the examination of the trait and state perspectives. Research purpose: This research sought to determine the relationship between work locus of control (WLOC) and psychological capital (PsyCap), with the objective of increasing alertness on the trait and state approach. Motivation for the study: The current study investigated the role of traits and states in contributing to the positive psychology arena within the recruitment industry.

Small Business Economics

Do the presence and nature of entrepreneurship impact on national happiness, and are nations with happy citizens better for entrepreneurs to start new businesses? To provide tentative answers we survey the literature on entrepreneurship and subjective well-being and use various data sources to uncover the first evidence of the relationship between entrepreneurship and happiness at the country level. We find that opportunity-motivated entrepreneurship may contribute to a nation’s happiness but only to a certain point, at which the effects of happiness begin to decline. Moreover, our results suggest that a nation’s happiness affects early-stage opportunity-driven entrepreneurial activity.