Barriers and growth constraints — the external operating context
In this section, we consider the main external barriers that may constrain small business development and which have to be circumvented, or managed, if effective growth is to be sustained. …
Explaining growth in small firms
Although a great deal has been written about the growth of small enterprises, there is no single theory which can adequately explain growth patterns in small businesses nor, as Gibb …
Growth and development in the small firm
Much of the literature that has been written about small business growth defines growth in terms of employment (Storey, 1994; Keeble, 1993; Barkham et al., 1996; Schutgens and Wever, 2000). …
Learning objectives
There are four learning objectives in this chapter: 1 To consider what is meant by growth in small firms. 2 To consider some of the theories and concepts that have …
Growth and development in the small business
David Smallbone and Peter Wyer 6.1 Introduction There has probably been more written about small business growth in recent years than any other aspect of the development or management of …
Chapter summary
Within a generation, scholarship has produced theories, evidence and new insights that have dramatically changed the prevalent view about the role of entrepreneurship in innovation and technological change. The conventional …
Innovation and public policy in the US
The federal government has played an active role in financing new high-technology firms since the Soviet Union launched the Sputnik satellite in the late 1950s. In recent years, European and …
The knowledge production function reconsidered
The model of the knowledge production function becomes even less compelling in view of the evidence documented earlier that entrepreneurial small firms are the engine of innovative activity in some …
The geographic context
How can small firms’ innovative activity be explained? While many explanations have been offered for the innovative prowess of small firms, one that is consistent with both entrepreneurship and fundamental …
The industry context
In comparison with the number of studies investigating the relationship between firm size and technological change, those examining the relationship between innovation and the external industry structure or environment are …
The role of firm size
At the heart of the conventional wisdom has been the belief that large enterprises able to exploit at least some market power are the engine of technological change. This view …
The knowledge production function
With regard to theories of innovation, firms are considered exogenous and their performance in generating technological change endogenous. For example, in the most prevalent model found in the literature of …
Learning objectives
There are six learning objectives in this chapter: 1 To understand how entrepreneurship, firm size and innovative activity are interrelated. 2 To gain basic understanding of the knowledge production function. …
Innovation and the small business
Zoltan J. Acs 5.1 Introduction Just as the economy has been besieged by a wave of technological change that has left virtually no sector of the economy untouched, scientific understanding …
Chapter summary
This chapter has explored how governments have sought to help small businesses, in the last sections focusing on the example of British government schemes and the particular case of Business …
A case study of advice and support schemes — Business Link
In most countries, government initiatives for small business in recent years have focused on providing advice and support to firms at various stages, from start-up, through early growth, to later …
Local policy
For most small firms the local context is far more important than it is for larger firms. Small firms depend to a greater extent on the local labour market, local …
Sector policy
Up to the 1960s, sector policy was a key part of government national economic planning, as discussed earlier, but this was abolished in 1979. However, following an initiative launched to …
National policy
4.9.1 Better regulation UK governments have attempted to respond to criticisms of the regulatory burdens that undermine small firms development through better regulation initiatives. An important step was the establishment …
Forms of government action for small business
There is a variety of ways in which government can seek to help small business. It is possible to distinguish these between the underlying policy aims, the policy method and …
Possibilities for targeting
This discussion has shown that there are usually rather narrow possibilities for policies that target small business. Despite this, there has been a strong tendency that seeks to target. For …
Limitations on government action
The difficulties of finding a niche for government actions are increased by the difficulties of acting effectively once a cause for intervention is found. The existence of a market failure …
Finding a niche for government action
It is difficult to find evidence that there is a general phenomenon of market failure or need for major government actions for small firms. Taking the normal definitions, SMEs are …
The case for government action for SMEs
In general, government action for SMEs has been justified by three main arguments: that market failures exist which inhibit small firm development; that there is a special public interest in …
The role of government
The first point on which it is important to be clear is that entrepreneurs and managers, not governments, develop small businesses. But government can have a profound effect on how …
Learning objectives
There are four learning objectives in this chapter: 1 To introduce the case for government action to help small businesses. 2 To understand the limitations on government actions to help …
Government and small business
Robert J. Bennett 4.1 Introduction This chapter seeks to introduce how government and small businesses inter-relate with each other. How can government act most effectively to help small firms, in …
Chapter summary
This chapter has reviewed some of the data on the incidence of self-employment in the UK. Central to the first part was the rise in self-employment from 1979 to 1990. …
The jobs of the self-employed
3.6.1 Industrial division The responses that make up the LFS allow the applied researcher to place the selfemployed into various standard industrial categories. Intuitively, one would expect most respondents to …
Personal characteristics of the self-employed
3.3.1 Gender Table 3.1 showed that males make up a significantly greater proportion of the selfemployed than do females. They have continued to do so throughout the period covered by …
Patterns of self-employment
The rest of this review concentrates upon the empirical patterns of self-employment in a number of key areas. These are: ■ the role of personal characteristics in the determination of …
Aggregate data
In Great Britain the total number of self-employed persons (calculated using the grossing-up procedures adopted for the Labour Force Survey) was some 3,633,000 in 2005. This represents an increase of …
Who are the self-employed and what do they do?
This section begins by finding out what the aggregate data say about the self-employed: How many are there? Which jobs do they do? Where do they live? How have these …
The self-employed
Detailed and comprehensive analysis of the self-employed received very little attention from the economics profession prior to the 1980s. Set against a background of declining numbers stemming from the days …
Learning objectives
There are three learning objectives in this chapter: 1 To appreciate the numbers of individuals involved in self-employment in the UK and their importance to the economy. 2 To be …
