Analysis of the psychological Impact of Start-up competition Successpreneurship and a need of such ecosystem in business education

Abstract

There has been research on some aspects of start-up competitions but there has been no research on how these competitions impact and shape the behaviour (more precisely entrepreneurial motivations) of winners. This research, being the first of its kind, brings to light some features if not all, of such impacts (from successively winning in multiple start-up competitions) on the winners. It identifies such winners of multiple Start-up competitions as “Successpreneurs”; the leveraging of this success in their entrepreneurial intentions and the essentiality of imbibing such motivations in students. Winning (and earning money through it) is psychologically related to Entrepreneurial Intentions and it presents a high propinquity to a real world Entrepreneurial environment than any other context for impacting Entrepreneurial Intentions. This is a major research gap in study of Entrepreneurial Intentions on candidates which is addressed in this paper; through a new definition of Successpreneurship. Using extant literature and performing qualitative research on the interviews conducted with Successpreneurs, this study proves how participation and winning business start-up competitions positively impacts them. The paper also defines a type of Entrepreneurship, which has not been defined and has not been given adequate academic focus; this is also of help to the governments of emerging economies (where such entrepreneurship is more common) to implement relevant policies to support such entrepreneurs. Finally, an alternative perception of entrepreneurship is defined that is applicable to a major social class of people, and the urgency to create an ecosystem, that caters to the entrepreneurial up-skilling of society.