City Research Online

Abstract

This three-study dissertation explores how entrepreneurs do strategy to achieve the objectives of survival and growth. I explored three separate but linked scenarios that entrepreneurs in early stage ventures often encounter, such as how to construct an identity for the audience, how to engage with resource counterparts, and how to acquire resources from the accelerator programs. This dissertation thus fleshes out entrepreneurs’ interaction with their industry context, engagement with their resource holders, and reflection on their own experience. Immersing in the financial technology (Fintech) space, I conducted three inductive studies based on 1) an archival secondary dataset, 2) a 5 month ethnographical fieldwork, and 3) an interview-based primary dataset to explore the phenomenon from the perspective of 1) strategic discourse, 2) scripts as patterns of practice, and 3) sensemaking. The theoretical lens and methodological approach firmly ground the inquiry in the social constructivist paradigm. Using the lenses of strategy as-practice and cultural entrepreneurship, I identify various practices that entrepreneurs have enacted and processes they have undergone when strategizing. This set of studies provide novel insights into identity construction as a process and entrepreneurial resource-acquiring process and contribute to the literature by developing a repertoire of practices for entrepreneurial strategy and connecting entrepreneurship phenomena with the field of strategy and organization.

Publication Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HG Finance
Departments:	Bayes Business School Bayes Business School > Finance Doctoral Theses

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