Title: Human capital in the entrepreneurship ecosystem

Authors: Annemarie Østergaard; Svetla T. Marinova

Addresses: Department of Business and Management, Aalborg University, Fibigerstræde 11, 9220 Aalborg East, Denmark ' Department of Business and Management, Aalborg University, Fibigerstræde 4, 9220 Aalborg East, Denmark

Abstract: Since Smith (1776) took consideration to human capital as an asset of economic value, academic interest has focused on the economic effects of human capital. In 1931, Schumpeter called for a focus on the individual entrepreneur or the creative destructor with his/her motives, wishes, aspirations and activities when dealing with entrepreneurship and entrepreneurs. Along these lines, this paper focuses on an in-depth investigation of the domain of human capital in Isenberg's entrepreneurship ecosystem. It captures the entrepreneurial mindset of the highly complex individual as a requisite for entrepreneurial success and ultimately, for business growth and development. The increasing literature debating human capital confirms the relevance of locating and refining the factors for entrepreneurial success. Consequently, this paper improves the roadmap of entrepreneurship ecosystems by adding the innate skills and conceptualising four generic archetypes, the local entrepreneur, the global entrepreneur, the incremental entrepreneur, and the radical entrepreneur, based on the combination of short/long education and narrow/broad labour.

Keywords: human capital; entrepreneurship ecosystem; labour experience; education; success stories; archetypes; local entrepreneur; global entrepreneur; incremental entrepreneur; radical entrepreneur.

DOI: 10.1504/IJESB.2018.095907

International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, 2018 Vol.35 No.3, pp.371 - 390

Received: 22 Nov 2016
Accepted: 30 Jun 2017
Published online: 26 Oct 2018 *

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