Linking social cultural milieu with entrepreneurial behavior of self-employed in emerging markets

Abstract

            Entrepreneurship is considered as the building block of the developing world as half of the people working are found to be self employed. The objective of the study is twofold: first, we aim to explore the factors of social cultural milieu and entrepreneurial behavior of the selected entrepreneurs; second, we aim to examine the relationship between the factors of social cultural milieu and entrepreneurial behavior. For this, exploratory factor analysis is used to explore the factors of social cultural milieu and entrepreneurial behavior of self employed individuals. Further, the present study used structural equation modeling to examine the relationship between the factors of social cultural milieu and entrepreneurial behavior. We collected data from 285 respondents through self-designed structured questionnaire. The result of the study highlighted three factors of social cultural milieu such as social support; attitude and education; whilst results highlighted five factors of entrepreneurial behavior such as network, autonomy, growth, risk and attitude. The results of SEM highlighted the significant relationship between the factors of social cultural milieu and entrepreneurial behavior. The study suggests some useful implications for universities on how to align their existing entrepreneurship programs in order to make students aware of entrepreneurial opportunities. We also suggest policy makers on developing better policies for promoting entrepreneurship among future generations.