Paul D. Reynolds – författare

Entrepreneurship is among the most vibrant and important parts of the economy. This important book enhances understanding of entrepreneurial dynamics, providing the first analysis of changes in US entrepreneurial activity. Based on the unprecedented Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics, it examines adult participation in new firm creation and differences in regional firm creation activity.  Shedding light on the importance of new firms for job growth, productivity enhancements, innovation, and routes for social mobility, the author tracks the success or failure of entrepreneurs, including comparisons of different groups, such as women and minorities, along with different countries.  All sectors of the population are making significant contributions. Significant implications for practitioners, educators and policy makers are discussed.

"This important Handbook of Entrepreneurial Dynamics reports on the Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics (PSED), the most comprehensive scientifically representative study to date of nascent entrepreneurs. The book is unique because the study identified individuals in the process of creating new businesses to understand how, at its very source, people move from considering the option of starting a new business to its actual founding.  This has never been done before in the history of entrepreneurship research… I cannot recommend this book more strongly to entrepreneurship scholars and those interested in where entrepreneurs come from and how they move from their initial idea to new venture founding."                                               --Claudia Bird Schoonhoven,  University of California, Irvine "This Handbook makes a terrific contribution to understanding entrepreneurship and new business creation.  Its 38 chapters report major findings from the Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics (PSED), an unprecedented research program involving more than a hundred researchers from 10 countries.  This Handbook is 'must reading' for anyone interested in entrepreneurship research."          --Andrew H. Van de Ven, Carlson School of Management, University of MinnesotaEntrepreneurial activity provides profound positive benefits across an important set of measures of social and economic well-being, much of it concentrated in new economic sectors such as information technology. Yet, even though entrepreneurship has been shown to provide many benefits, it is surprising that there has not been a systematic study of the entrepreneurial process. The Handbook of Entrepreneurial Dynamics: The Process of Business Creation fills this gap by offering theories, ideas, and measures that can be used to explore and understand the factors that encompass and influence the creation of new businesses. The chapters in the handbook provide the rationale for questionnaires used in the Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics (PSED). The PSED is a research program that was initiated to provide systematic, reliable, and generalizable data on important features of the new business creation process. The PSED includes information on the proportion and characteristics of the adult population involved in efforts to start businesses, the activities and characteristics that comprise the nature of the business start-up process, and the proportion and characteristics of those business start-up efforts that actually become new businesses. The handbook also describes the PSED data collection process; provides documentation of the interview schedules, codebooks, data preparation and weighting scheme; as well as offers examples of how analyses of PSED data might be conducted. The authors identify specific measures that can be used to operationalize theory as well as provide evidence from the PSED data sets on these measures' reliability and validity. The Handbook of Entrepreneurial Dynamics is ideal for a sizeable audience, including graduate students, academics, and librarians in schools of business and management who need a comprehensive reference on business creation. In addition, researchers and policy makers at the federal, state, and local level will find this an invaluable reference covering all of the factors involved in new venture formation. Key Features: * Considers categories of data not available prior to the PSED* Includes a comprehensive overview of theories about new business formation* Provides demographics of nascent entrepreneurs* Analyzes the cognitive characteristics of nascent entrepreneurs* Explores all of the processes of new business formation

This in-depth assessment includes empirical descriptions of a broad range of relevant features of the entrepreneurial process. By using representative samples of nascent entrepreneurs and ventures in the US, it allows extrapolation to US populations of entrepreneurs, pre-profit ventures, and activity in all economic sectors. Outcomes including profitability and disengagement are identified in multiple follow-up interviews.

A useful resource for scholars concerned with business creation, this book also makes an engaging supplementary course book for upper division and graduate courses in business plan creation and research methods. Policy analysts emphasizing programs and policies to enhance business creation will also find it enlightening.

This book reviews some of the most salient features of grass roots business creation, such as the total amount of activity, differences related to national economic development, the relationship to business churning and job creation, the impact of national context, the mixed contributions of high growth firms, the modest effect of external financial support, the unequal distribution of sunk costs related to successful payback, importance as an option for the most desperate in poor countries, and the tendency to overlook the continuing incremental impact of Main Street business creation.

Entrepreneurial scholars, faculty, policy analysts and graduate students interested in economic development, entrepreneurship and public policy will find clarity and gain a depth of knowledge about policymaking and business creation with The Truth about Entrepreneurship.

Implications for public policy varies for countries at different stages of development. The book includes an introduction to harmonized data developed over the past two decades while avoiding technical complexity. Descriptions are based on representative samples of business creation with an emphasis on grassroots business creation in countries during all stages of economic development.

Entrepreneurship, economic development and public policy scholars and faculty as well as policy analysts focusing on economic development will benefit from the breadth of knowledge included in this exploration of business creation.