Abstract
This article examines the role of parental transmission of entrepreneurship in the sales performance of small and micro-enterprises. We posit that while the intergenerational transmission of attitudes may be crucial for the entrepreneurial entry decision (as highlighted by the literature), cognitive elements and transmission of knowledge are more important for actual venture performance. Applying social cognitive theory (SCT), we leverage a large World Bank dataset to understand the drivers of small and micro-enterprise performance in the understudied developing economy context of Sri Lanka. The study illuminates how parental transmission is conditioned by cognitive skills. We also highlight that both the education and business-specific managerial experience of founders, as captured by firm age, may substitute for the parental transmission of business knowledge. The research offers theoretical and practical implications, interpreting the human capital drivers of small and micro-enterprise success through the lens of SCT and considering the complementary and compensatory influences on outcomes.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Number of pages | 29 |
| Journal | International Small Business Journal |
| Early online date | 12 Mar 2025 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 12 Mar 2025 |
Bibliographical note
Copyright © The Author(s) 2025. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).Keywords
- business founder
- entrepreneurship
- parental transmission
- performance
- social cognitive theory