Towards a Better Understanding of Entrepreneurial Teams: Investigating Temporal Dynamics on Multiple Levels

This dissertation investigates entrepreneurial teams in the process of creating new ventures. The new venture creation process is complex. Different actors impact the new venture creation process in various ways, either facilitating or complicating it. The three studies at the heart of this thesis aim to cut through this complexity by examining the social context (i.e., entrepreneurial teams) and the temporal dynamics occurring in more detail. All studies address the conditions underpinning entrepreneurial teamwork over time and the consequences of entrepreneurial teamwork. The dissertation aims to understand how entrepreneurial teams work together, how their teamwork develops over time, and how entrepreneurial teamwork impacts team members. In Study 1, the authors develop a theoretical model to show how different team processes affect entrepreneurial self-efficacy. Entrepreneurial self-efficacy is the entrepreneurs‘ individual perception that they can cope with the upcoming tasks in the new venture creation process. In doing so, the model accounts for the temporal development of the assumed relationships between entrepreneurial self-efficacy and team processes. The second study empirically investigates parts of the theoretical model. Using a longitudinal field approach, this study explores shared dynamics between entrepreneurial self-efficacy and team action processes. The last study utilizes qualitative interviews to explore changes in entrepreneurial teamwork and identify various team adaptation triggers and processes during new venture creation. Taken together, these studies examine different aspects of entrepreneurial teamwork and thus contribute to a better understanding of entrepreneurial teamwork.