Knowing What to Do and Doing What You Know

Abstract

Entrepreneurship has traditionally been studied either as a set of psychological characteristics or as a residual of environmental structures such as social networks. In line with more recent process views, the authors propose the study of entrepreneurship as a form of expertise—a set of skills, models, and processes that can be acquired with time and deliberate practice. This article delineates the domain of entrepreneurial expertise and demarcates the role of deliberate practice within it, demonstrates the efficacy of effectuation as a theory about entrepreneurial expertise, and develops testable propositions about effectual action in the development of entrepreneurial expertise and firm growth.