The role of human capital outcomes in generating business ideas

Abstract

Purpose Despite the existence of a vast body of research on entrepreneurship, little is known about why some entrepreneurs are able to generate and realize more business ideas than others. This study aims to present a prospective answer to this question by empirically examining the relationships among human capital outcomes (entrepreneurial knowledge and skills) and the number of business ideas generated and implemented. Additionally, the authors examined the moderating effect of the entrepreneurial self-efficacy on the proposed relationships. Design/methodology/approach A statistical analysis on a sample of 340 Russian entrepreneurs was conducted. Findings The results from the analysis indicated that human capital outcomes (entrepreneurial knowledge and skills) are positively related to the number of generated and implemented ideas. Furthermore, it was seen that entrepreneurial self-efficacy significantly moderates the relationship between human capital outcomes and the number of implemented ideas. However, self-efficacy has no significant moderating effect on the relationships among human capital outcomes and the number of generated ideas. Finally, the results showed that the number of ideas generated mediates the relationships among human capital outcomes and the number of ideas implemented. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no previous study has investigated the combination of such variables as entrepreneurial human capital outcomes, entrepreneurial self-efficacy and the number of new business ideas. This paper investigates this gap in the literature with an empirical analysis of the relations between the mentioned variables based on data collected from Russian entrepreneurs.