Where do hybrids come from? Entrepreneurial team heterogeneity as an avenue for the emergence of hybrid organizations

Abstract

This conceptual article aims to respond to the poorly addressed question of the emergence of hybrid organizations; that is, organizations that embrace several institutional logics. It does so by developing a model and a set of propositions focusing on the heterogeneity of the entrepreneurial team as a possible driver for hybridity throughout the entrepreneurial process and up to the emergence of a hybrid organization. Contributing to the literatures on (collective) entrepreneurship, imprinting and hybrid organizations, we advance several avenues and conditions under which the heterogeneity of the entrepreneurial team may imprint the entrepreneurial process and lead to the creation of hybrid organizations. Our propositions connect the individual, team and organizational levels and thus, advance our understanding of how institutional logics can be combined across different levels of analysis and throughout the stages of an entrepreneurial process.