Entrepreneurial support: a theoretical framework and case study of Tunisia

Abstract

Entrepreneurial support, its determinants, its articulation, and its actors are always analyzed from both processual and emergent perspectives. Because a certain level of coherence must be maintained, public structures that are perceived as not opting for a process/emergence mix in their support systems are not hostile to using it when the context permits it and when the person receiving support accepts to be at the center of the design of his or her support. Literature reveals that a compromise between these two approaches has neither been established nor, as far as we are aware, exhaustively investigated. This research sought to highlight the processual nature of both the form and substance of entrepreneurial support. To achieve this, we administered a qualitative survey to 21 Tunisian business proprietors. The results indicate that in the Tunisian context, accompaniment is structurally processual and superimposed on an entrepreneurial process that both the accompaniers and the accompanied co-pilot in order to maintain coherence and complementarity during the training of the accompanied in the trade of entrepreneur. In addition, coaching is fundamentally and intrinsically emergent because it is geared toward endogenous action, co-constructed, and contextualized due to the prominence of personalized learning needs and the coachee's situational framework in relation to the enterprise he or she must establish.