Putting Your Best Foot Forward? Assessments of Entrepreneurial Social Competence from Two Perspectives MANUELA N . HOEHN-WEISS, CANDIDA G . BRUSH, AND ROBERT A. BARON
MANUELA N . H O E H N WEISS is a doctoral candidate in strategy and policy in the School of Management at Boston University in Boston, MA.
[email protected] CANDIDA G.
BRUSH
is an associate professor of strategy and pohcy in the School of Management and director of the Council for Women's Entrepreneurship and Leadership at Boston University in Boston, MA.
[email protected] R O B E R T A. B A R O N
is the Dean R. Wellington Professor of Management in the Lally School of Management and Technology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY.
[email protected]
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"Bet on the jockey, not on the horse!"
early all investors agree that it is the quahty of the management team that is central to the funding decision. But how do we evaluate these "jockeys"? Much of the previous research in this area focused on personality traits of entrepreneurs; however, results of these studies are inconclusive in explaining success or failure of new ventures (Shaver and Scott [1991]). Instead, another approach, which examines the cognitive influences on entrepreneurial behavior has gained more acceptance (Bird [1989]; Shaver and Scott [1991]; Busenitz and Barney [1997]). Central to this process of starting a business are social interactions—the engagements the entrepreneur has with resource providers, potential employees, and other stakeholders (Baron and Markman [2002]).
N
An entrepreneur's ability to interact effectively with others is based on discrete social skills, referred to as "social competence" (Baron and Markman [2003]). Social competence comprises persuasion, social adaptability, impression management, and social perception (Baron and Markman [2003]). This summary term captures the combined effects of various social skills such as the ability to perceive others accurately, make a good first impression, and persuade others to change their views or behavior (Wayne and Kacmar [1991]). One arena where social competence is critically important is the early phase of ven-
ture creation where entrepreneurs meet with potential investors to persuade them to provide financial capital. An entrepreneur's presentation generally includes information about a new opportunity and information on the ability of the entrepreneur. In effect, the presentation provides a signal to investors about his/her ability to successfully develop and manage a new venture designed to develop this opportunity (Feldman and March [1981]; Mason and Harrison [2001]). Creating a negative impression during these social interactions can result in failure to sell the business opportunity to investors, and limit investment potential (Mason and Harrison [2001]). In order to explore these social interactions and how they are perceived both by potential investors and by the entrepreneurs themselves, we draw on theories of social and cognitive psychology. Specifically, we explore the perceptions entrepreneurs have about their own social competence and compare these perceptions to assessments of outsiders. This comparative assessment and comparison of self-reports to independent observers is a method used in social psychology (Moskowitz [1990]), but is a unique approach in examining entrepreneurial behavior. Our work extends recent research on social competence (see Baron and Markman [2003]) and has implications for ways that entrepreneurs can improve their chances of acquiring capital and other resources in the early phases of business start-up. THE JOURNAL OF PRIVATE EQUITY
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ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL COMPETENCIES A social psychological perspective on new venture creation considers social activity as a central feature of the process (Shaver and Scott [1991]). According to social psychologists, cognitive heuristics—mental "rules of thumb"— are utilized to guide judgments and "make sense" of the process which is highly uncertain. These account for the ways in which the external environment is represented in the mind of the founder of a new venture (Shaver and Scott [1991]; Krueger [2000]); in other words, how the entrepreneur perceives his/her environment. For example, the entrepreneur might have an inaccurate perception of how receptive others (customers, family, business associates or bankers) are to the business concept. In addition to cognitive heuristics, other cognitive influences also guide the choices that entrepreneurs make in the venture creation process, and affect social interactions. The extent to which social competence enhances effective interaction with others (e.g., venture capitalists, employees, customers) is based on several research streams in social psychology, cognitive psychology, and the study of venture capital decisions. The level of social skills strongly affects the outcomes experienced by individuals in many contexts, including important business settings (e.g., Segrin and Kenney [1995]). For instance, being skilled at impression management, social perception, and persuasiveness results in more successful outcomes in job interviews (Riggio and Throckmorton [1988]), yearly performance reviews (Wayne and Kacmar [1991]), and negotiations (Lewicki et al. [1997]). Furthermore, social competence is related to financial performance in selfemployed entrepreneurial firms in the cosmetics industry and high-tech industries (Baron and Markman [2003]). Finally, the view that social competence influences financial success is also prevalent in the venture capital literature. There is agreement that human capital is the single most important feature determining an investment decision, and, given vast differences in the ways venture capitalists assess human capital, some sort of interviewing, social interaction, or presentation is usually combined with job analysis, documentation analysis, and other variables (Smart [1999]). The personal chemistry interpersonal style, and skills of the entrepreneur all can make a difference in funding outcome (Hisrich andjancowicz [1990]). Frequently the decision on initial screening is made on the basis of "investor fit" to the entrepreneur (Fried and Hisrich [1994]). In sum, there is support for the premise that strong social competence would be related to likeli18
hood of obtaining outside funding. This raises the question as to how social competence is perceived. In our research we explored evaluations of social competence from two perspectives—that of the entrepreneurs and that of outside evaluators. Because of personal biases we expect evaluations to differ between the two groups. Specifically, self-efficacy of entrepreneurs—the entrepreneurs' beliefs in their ability to carry out specific actions that produce desired outcomes— may affect their ability to execute a particular behavior (Bandura [1997]). Moreover, optimism may color perceptions of setbacks or outside threats (Seligman [1998]). On one hand, self-efficacy can increase the tendency for entrepreneurial actions (Chen et al. [1998]), while on the other hand, over-optimism can lead to unwise decisions and affect firm performance (Mehta and Cooper [2000]). Hence, in addition to individual background biases, cognitive factors may infiuence an entrepreneur's perceptions of his/her ability to persuade others to provide resources. We therefore considered the foUowing four questions: 1. How do entrepreneurs seeking capital assess their own social competence? 2. Is there a difference in social competence assessments by entrepreneurs between those receiving and those not receiving funding? 3. How do outside experts view entrepreneurs' social competence? 4. To what degree does the assessment of outside experts differ from that of the entrepreneurs? RESEARCH METHODOLOGY Sample and Data Collection This exploratory study examines the presentation (i.e., the "pitch") of entrepreneurs as they seek equity funding.' We used three types of data: 1) self-evaluations of the entrepreneurs' social competence, 2) evaluations of the entrepreneurs' social competence by outsiders—both business experts and social psychologists, and 3) followup surveys to assess funding outcome and business progress of the entrepreneurs' ventures. Using multiple methods is referred to as triangulation which ensures greater convergent validity Qick [1979]) for the construct of social competence. In other words, we took care to ensure that we were really measuring what we set out to measure. The entrepreneurs' investor presentations were videotaped by a Boston Venture Capital Consulting Firm (BVCCF) that
PUTTING YOUR BEST FOOT FORWARD? ASSESSMENTS OF ENTREI'RP.NEURIAL SOCIAL COMPETENCE FROM TWO PERSPECTIVES
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counsels entrepreneurs on business plans and presentations, conducts evaluations and due diligence, and connects entrepreneurs to venture capitalists and angel investors. Entrepreneurs participating in this study had submitted business plans to BVCCF between 1999 and 2000. During this 10-nionth period more than 500 plans were received by BVCCF. Because of the owner's networking within the local community and emphasis on women entrepreneurs, a slightly higher percentage of plans by women founders was received. Of these, 102 business plans (or 20%) met the two key requirements for consideration and follow-up: 1) ventures were based in New England, and 2) seeking between US$l-5 million investment. The sample selected out of the total pool of plans was completely random and 102 entrepreneurs were invited to participate in our project. Approximately 10% refused to participate, and another 17 entrepreneurs changed their mind at a later point and were dropped from the sample. Thefinalsample of entrepreneurs who participated fully in our study was 75. Each of the entrepreneurs signed a confidentiality release form and completed a self-questionnaire assessing their social competence along key dimensions. The entrepreneurs were then videotaped during an investor presentation at the office of BVCCF.^ All entrepreneurs were asked the same question at the outset of the presentation which was "Tell me about your business idea." In
many cases, it took entrepreneurs several minutes to answer this question, and instead, they provided significant background on their personal history, their perceptions of the market, or their narrowly focused product, rather than business details. Since the video footage of the presentations was of varying length, a social psychologist edited our video footage to two-minute clips of representative footage for each entrepreneur. Social psychology graduate students and executive MBA business student volunteers at two independent east coast universities then rated sets of these video clips of the entrepreneurs' investor presentations along various social competence measures (for details see the "Measures" section of this article). In order to minimize routine bias we randomized the order in which the videotapes were shown to both groups of evaluators. Six months after the entrepreneurs' initial self-assessment we contacted the entrepreneurs by telephone and asked them to complete a foUow-up survey. These followup surveys provided information regarding funding success, business development, and whether they had met their sales/profit objectives. FALL 2004
AH three types of data—the self-questionnaire by the entrepreneur, the evaluations by outside experts, either psychologists or MBA students, and the follow-up survey— were required for an entrepreneur to be included in the study. Complete evaluator data and foUow-up surveys were collected for 66 companies (although all 75 entrepreneurs completed self-questionnaires and submitted their business plans), thus giving us a total sample size of 66. The number of evaluations by outsiders ranged from 3 to 109 per company. A greater number of evaluators were used in order to minimize personal bias of each evaluator. Measures Entrepreneurs rated themselves on 44 items designed to assess various social dimensions comprising social competence. These social dimensions are based on previously used measures and extend previous work (see Riggio [1986]; Baron and Markman [2003]). Specifically entrepreneurs were asked how they perceived themselves in certain social situations using a five-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 = never true to 5 = always true. The dimensions of social competence which we used included the following: • social perception—accuracy in perceiving others (e.g., their traits, intentions, and motives (7 questions), • social adaptability—the ability to adapt to, or feel comfortable in, a wider range of social situations (6 questions), • persuasion—the ability to change others' views or behavior in face-to-face encounters (5 questions), • impression management—a wide range of techniques for inducing positive reactions in others (5 questions), • emotional expressiveness—the ability to express one's emotions and feelings clearly, and so to generate enthusiasm in others (5 questions), • optimism—having a positive outlook and expecting the best outcomes possible (8 questions), • self-efficacy—belief in one's ability to carry out specific actions that produce desired outcomes (8 questions). Multiple items per dimension were used following previous research (see Riggio [1986]; Baron and Markman [2003]). Prior to our analysis we adjusted reverse-coded items to ensure the same direction of measures, i.e., the higher someone scored on a given question, the more of THE JOURNAL OF PRIVATE EQUITY
19
EXHIBIT
1
Select Descriptive Statistics of Sample (n = 66) Entrepreneurs: Age Gender First entrepreneurial effort # of previous ventures Ownership share Years in current company MBA Ventures: Year business started Year of first sale TMT total Funding Currently operating Currently have sales Currently profitable Industry (info-based) Evaluators (not aggregate measures): Gender Age range
Mean
Median
Mode
s.d.
n=
41.95
40.0
44.0 1.0 0.0 1.0 100.0 2.0 0.0
10.17
65 66
2.16 67.10 4.81
1996.59 1996.24 3.36
2.0 80.0 2.0
1997.5 1997.0 2.0
the attribute measured the person possesses. The outside evaluators assessed the entrepreneurs' social competence along similar dimensions: attractiveness, likableness, energy, cognitive intelligence (= intellectual ability), emotional intelligence or EQ {— ability to regulate one's own emotions and influence those of other people), social skills, persuasiveness, and overall quality of the idea along a five-point Likert scale. These items are based on previous research (see Baron and Brush [1999]; Baron and Markman [2003]). Items for both questionnaires were pre-tested to ensure robustness during two pilot studies conducted with 182 undergraduate and graduate students at two different universities. VIDEOTAPE ANALYSIS AND RESULTS Who were our entrepreneurs? In our random sample we had a range of businesses, including high-tech and science-based as well as ordinary businesses. To give some examples, one entrepreneur, who did not even know how much funding he was asking for, already had a contract with some airlines to supply them with his wife's salad dressing. Another entrepreneur, together with her business partner, had invented the technology for the backlit signs used for advertising which can now be found at almost every airport. Yet another entrepreneur was part of a team of passionate golfers who wanted to play golf instead of working full time, which had prompted them to start an online golf tee time booking site. Mirroring these differences in scope of business ventures were a wide 20
1999.0 1997.0 2.0 0.0 1.0 1.0 0.0 1.0 2.0 1.0
2.47 33.08 6.54
60 49 49 63
Percentage
61% male 68.8% not first
62.1 % no MBA 3.40 4.12 2.43
64 33 58 65 66 64 61 66
73.8% no 72.7% yes 62.5% yes 85.2% no 40.9% yes
1309 1284
54.2% female 56.3% 20-39 yr
range of social skills among the entrepreneurs. Some fidgeted incessantly with their clothing while others presented their plan in a very professional manner. Some took a long time to get to the point while others were very succinct in answering our question "Tell me about your business idea." Some entrepreneurs seemed personable while others appeared to be arrogant or aloof To answer our four specific research questions we used descriptive statistics, t-tests, and factor analysis. All tests were performed using SPSS statistical software. Initial descriptive statistics showed us the characteristics of the entrepreneurs, their ventures, and the evaluators {see Exhibit i). Characteristics of the Entrepreneurs: For 68.2% of the entrepreneurs the current venture was not the first entrepreneurial effort. Of those experienced entrepreneurs, 69.4% had had one to two previous ventures, with a range from one to 16 previous start-up experiences. More than half indicated that they worked in their current company for up to two years, with a range from one year to 40 years. Approximately 21.3% of entrepreneurs had presented their plan once, 31.2% 2-5 times, and 47.5% had presented their plan more than five times, up to 200 times {see Exhibit i). Characteristics of the Ventures: The ventures in our
sample were founded between 1981 and 2000. The median and mode salesfiguresshowed that many ventures did not have sales at the time when entrepreneurs filled out their initial self-questionnaires. At the time of the six-month follow-up, the majority of ventures (72.7%) were still oper-
PUTTING YOUR BEST FOOT FORWARD? ASSESSMENTS OF ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL COMPETENCE FROM TWO PERSPECTIVES
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EXHIBIT
2
T-Tests: Funding Outcome by Entrepreneurs' Assessment of Social Competence Measures (n = 66) Mean
Funding ves s.d. n
Persuasion Self-efficacy Social Adapt.
3.76 4.62 4.99
.55 .37 .36
17 17 17
3.65 4.50 4.85
Funding no. s.d. n .63 48 .45 48 .40 48
Emotional Expressiveness
2.95
80.
17
2.90
.59
* p< .05; ** p< .01;
Mean
48
F-test
(d.f.)
p-value
.01 1.42 .37
(63) (63) (63)
.554 .324 .305
2.28
(63)
.803
*** p< .0
ating, and 62.5% of the ventures had current sales, but of those about 53.8% were under projections, 35.9% were close to projections, and only 10.3% were somewhat over projections. Not unexpectedly, only 14.8% were profitable six months later and of those 37.5% were under projections. Only one venture reported profits somewhat over projections. Lastly, 26.2% of the ventures received funding whereas 73.8% did not. The ventures ranged in type from retail (designer shoes, furniture), to dot.coms (hats, food service delivery, Asian gifts, computers), to manufacturing products (gauges, child care products), to business services (legal, fashion design) (see Exhibit 1). Characteristics of the Evaluators: Approximately 54% of
evaluators were MBA or Executive MBA students and 46% of evaluators were advanced graduate students in social psychology. Because we were interested in the aggregate opinion of evaluators for each entrepreneur and also across entrepreneurs, we computed averages for the groups to obtain a "representative" evaluator per entrepreneur. We ran a frequency analysis and compared variances among the different groups in order to assess inter-rater reliability— the consistency of our raters (Finn [1970]; Light et al. [1990]). Although there was slight variation within and among the 66 entrepreneurs, we reasoned that an aggregate measure for all 66 groups of evaluators would give us a matched pair to use for our comparison of central tendency analysis: an aggregate pool of 66 entrepreneurs and an aggregate pool of 66 outsiders' evaluations.
optimism (means ranging from 3.6615 to 4.1212); entrepreneurs rated themselves lowest on questions assessing emotional expressiveness (means ranging from 2.7692 to 3.1061). In order to determine whether the items on the entrepreneurs' self-questionnaire assessed distinct aspects of social competence, we performed a factor analysis, a data reduction technique used for deciding which items on an index or scale seem to be measuring a single dimension of the variable being studied.-' Our analysis yielded four factors, or dimensions, of our construct, which were labeled as persuasiveness, self-efficacy, social adaptability, and
emotional expressiveness. Discrete factors did not appear for either social perception, impression management, or optimism. In other words, this analysis shows that there are four basic factors that are comprised of multiple variables. Is there a difference in social competence assessments by entrepreneurs between those receiving and not receiving funding?
An analysis of differences in social competence between those receiving funding and those not receiving funding showed that there was no significant difference in perceptions between the two groups {see Exhibit 2). In other words, the group of entrepreneurs who received funding did not rate themselves any differently on the aspects of persuasion, self-efficacy, self-adaptability, and emotional expressiveness than did the group of entrepreneurs who did not receive funding.
How do entrepreneurs seeking capital assess their own social competence?
How do outside experts view entrepreneurs' social competence?
Our analysis showed that overall self-rankings of the entrepreneurs' social competence measures were quite high, with most means well above the neutral point 3. The highest rankings were those on the questions capturing self-efficacy (means rangingfi-om4.4462 to 4.7385), followed by questions assessing social adaptability (means ranging from 4.2576 to 4.5303) and questions assessing
Overall outside evaluators gave entrepreneurs lower ratings on social competence measures than the entrepreneurs gave themselves. Ratings by outsiders were right around or slightly below the neutral point 3. Since different instruments were used for the entrepreneurs' self-assessments and the outsiders' evaluations, only the measures present in both instruments were considered in
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EXHIBIT
3
T-Tests: Entrepreneurs/Evaluators by Assessment of Select Social Competence Measures (n = 66)
EQ/emotional expressiveness Social skills/soc. adaptability Persuasion P < 05;
Mean
Entrepr. s.d. n
2.92
.60
66
3.08
4.36
.43
66
3.68
.60
66
** p< .01;
Eval. s.d. n
F-test
(d.f.)
.39
66
16.52
(107.38)
.089
3.07
.48
66
.07
(130)
.000***
2.91
.54
66
.19
(130)
.000***
Mean
*** p < .001
this analysis. Outsiders' evaluations of entrepreneurs' emotional intelligence and social skills were only a Httle more positive than neutral (means of 3.0829 and 3.06096 respectively), and outsiders' ratings of the entrepreneurs' persuasion skills were slightly negative (mean of 2.9096). To what degree does the assessment of outside experts differ from that of the entrepreneurs?
Analysis of entrepreneurs' self-perceptions and those of outsiders showed that there is a difference in assessments of EQ/emotional expressiveness, social skills/social adaptability, and persuasion {see Exhibit 3). Entrepreneurs believe they are stronger in both social skills and persuasion (p < .000) than outside experts do while EQ/emotional expressiveness ratings do not differ significantly. It should be noted that the matches between the items are not all exact, but the description used to explain the terms was similar. In fact, prior theory suggests that these items do indeed measure approximately the same construct even though they are being measured by different methods, referred to as structural validity. In this case, the measures are within theoretically relevant limits on the consistency of characteristics (Moskowitz [1990]). Therefore, in this context, emotional intelligence (EQ) and emotional expressiveness can be compared as can social skills and social adaptability; the wording for persuasion was consistent in both instruments. DISCUSSION Contrary to our initial predictions, we found no differences in self-perceptions between those entrepreneurs receiving and those not receiving funding. We suspect that these results may refiect the fact that the criteria applied by venture capitalists in making funding decisions include factors other than those we measured (Mason and Harrison [1999]). Further, the biases that entrepreneurs bring to their assessments may also be reflected here. 22
p-value
Indeed it may be that entrepreneurs have an "overinflated" or overly optimistic view of their abilities and competencies (Seligman [1998]). This study adds to previous work examining dimensions of social competence— social adaptability, self-efficacy and emotional expressiveness —and financial performance (Baron and Markman [2003]). Yet we did find distinct differences in the ratings of entrepreneurs and outside evaluators. In particular, entrepreneurs rated themselves more highly on persuasion and social skills than outside experts did. It is not clear if the entrepreneurs made unrealistic assessments about their capabilities in these areas; however, if they do exaggerate their perceived capabilities this may explain why some entrepreneurs are unable to obtain needed resources. Biases in self-perceptions and errors in judgment allow entrepreneurs to undertake new economic activity in the face of uncertainty (Sarasvathy [2000]). On the other hand, it is possible that outside experts were more "critical," having been educated and trained to identify social behavior. No difference was perceived between entrepreneurs and outside experts with regard to emotional intelligence. Our results also show that the raters who watched the videotapes perceived differences between entrepreneurs' presentations on all dimensions even though the tapes averaged only two minutes in length. This supports research on social perception indicating that much useflil and reasonably accurate information can be acquired about others from brief encounters (Zebrowitz and Collins [1997]). In other words,firstimpressions are made quickly. In the video evaluations some evaluators made a determination as to social competence before the two-minute videos were completely played. While this may suggest bias on the part of evaluators, we used multiple evaluators, from which we took an average, thereby lessening the influence of individual biases on interpretation of the data. Our exploratory study is limited by its small sample
PUTTING YOUR BEST FOOT FORWARD? ASSESSMENTS OF ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL COMPETENCE FI .40 on a single factor and no cross-loadings > .25). These four factors were labeled as persuasiveness, self-efficacy, social adaptability, and emotional expressiveness. Discrete factors did not appear for either social perception, impression management, or optimism. As a next step we tested reliability of the measures produced by the factor analysis to assess our measures'
A
Factor Loadings of Social Competence Items^ Item Persuasiveness q29.1 am very good at getting other people to do what I want in most situations. q28.1 can talk others into taking my side or into adopting my point of view. q27.1 can persuade others to do almost anything. q26.1 can get others to do what I want. q30. If I set out to persuade someone to change their views on an issue I am usually quite successful in doing so. q32.1 can take advantage of others if I want to. q34. I can readily seem to like another person even if this is not so. q35. I generally make a good first impression on others. Self-efficacy q56.1 usually feel I can handle the typical problems that come up in life. q51 I can handle the situations that life brings. q49.1 am strong enough to overcome life's struggles. q54.1 feel competent to deal effectively with the real world. q50. At root I am a strong person. q.53 I rarely feel that there is nothing I can do well. q52.1 usually feel that I am a successful person. q55.1 don't often feel like a failure. Social Adaptability q22.1 can easily adjust to being in just about any social situation. q21. I can adapt readily to new people and situations. q20.1 can get along well with other people. q23.1 can be comfortable with all types of people young or old, people from the same or different backgrounds than myself. Emotional Expressiveness Q39. I am very sensitive to criticism of others. Q40.1 am often concerned about what others think of me. Q37. Whatever emotion I feel on the inside tends to show on the outside. Q38. Other people can usually tell pretty much how I feel at a given time. Q36. People can always read my emotions even if I try to cover them up.
Factor 1
Factor 2
Factor 3
Factor 4
.86 .83 .80 .80 .76 .46 .43 .46
.81 .70 .58 .53 .47 .85 .70 .68
.77
.70 .51 .50
.86 .79 .91 .73 .68
"Loadings greater than .30 are shown
24
PUTTING YOUR BEST FOOT FORWARD? ASSESSMENTS OF ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL COMPETENCE FROM TWO PERSPECTIVES
FALL 2004
ability to yield consistent results each time they are applied. Three of the four measures easily passed the acceptable threshold of .70 for rehability (Nunnally [1979]); Cronbach's alphas were .8581, .8190, and .lAlly respectively. The fourth factor, although lower with a Cronbach's alpha of .6535, passed the benchmark of .60 for exploratory research (Robinson et al. [1991]), so we retained this factor as well for subsequent analysis. Factor scores were created for all four factors using weighted measures for all items that loaded on one of the four factors.
Busenitz, L., andj. Barney. "Differences Between Entrepreneurs and Managers in Large Organizations: Biases and Heuristics in Strategic Decision-Making."_/oMmfl/ of Business Venturing, Vol. 12, No. 1 (1997), pp. 9-30.
ENDNOTES
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An earlier version of this article was published in Fiontiers of Entrepreneurship Research, Babson CoUege-Kauffman Foundation Entrepreneurial Research Conference [2002]. The authors are indebted to Carrie Mclndoe of Strategic Capital Resources, Inc. for her support of this project. Research assistance was provided by Julie Brush, Dana Mavica, and Graeme Campbell. The authors also wish to thank Richard Hanna and Patricia Wakefield for their helpful suggestions regarding the data analysis. 'In another related project we examine the combined effects of business plans and actual presentations on the likelihood of receiving equity funding (see Hoehn et al. [2002]). ^While videotaped presentations are used in social psychology as a means to assess social skills (Riggio and Throckmorton [1988]), this type of media is rarely used in research on entrepreneurial behavior. •'For a detailed description of our factor analysis please refer to the Appendix.
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Robinson, J.P., P.R. Shaver, and L.S. Wrightsnian. "Criteria for Scale Selection and Evaluation. Measures of Personality and Social Psychological Attitudes." InJ.P. Robinson, P.R. Shaver, and L.S. Wrightsnian, eds., pp. 1-15. San Diego, CA: Academic Press, 1991.
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PUTTING YOUR BEST FOOT FORWARD? ASSESSMENTS OF ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL COMPETENCE FROM TWO PERSPECTIVES
FALL 2004
