Kiefer Published Article in Business Economics Journal

In their paper, business professor Kip Kiefer and Parul Manocha examine the often-overlooked role of Entrepreneurship Industry (EI) intermediaries—the organizations and actors that guide entrepreneurs through the process of recognizing opportunities, making decisions, and shaping outcomes. They find that intermediaries can be critical in moving people from simply seeing opportunities to acting on them and that access to these intermediaries increases the likelihood of entrepreneurial action. However, relying on intermediaries reduces the novelty of entrepreneurial ideas and, therefore, stifles innovation.

Their findings are important for both research and policy. Scholars should examine how intermediaries shape entrepreneurial behavior, while policymakers should design systems that expand access to intermediaries but also preserve room for creativity.

SBEJ is an entrepreneurship journal that publishes original, rigorous theoretical and empirical research addressing all aspects of entrepreneurship and small business economics, with a special emphasis on the economic and societal relevance of research findings for scholars, practitioners, and policymakers.