| The world is paying more and more attention to entrepreneurship.Entrepreneurship is a highly creative and dynamic activity.Serial entrepreneurship can not only promote employment,bring wealth to entrepreneurs and employees,and improve individuals' material life,but also promote a country's economic development and continuous progress of science and technology.It may even lead a new wave of science and technology and become the new engine fueling global economic growth.In recent years,China has increasingly emphasized the important role of entrepreneurship and advocated "mass entrepreneurship and innovation" to promote the development of entrepreneurial activities in China.With the encouragement of all parties,Zhongguancun in Beijing's Haidian district,Binhai New Area of Tianjin and other areas with dense resources for entrepreneurship and innovation have emerged one after another,and more and more entrepreneurs have emerged nationwide.However,entrepreneurship is a process with high uncertainty,which leads to high risk of failure.In 2015,an article published by Forbes magazine showed that the failure rate of start-ups reached a staggering 90%.However,there are still some exentrepreneurs who have risen from failure and choose to become serial entrepreneurs.In practice,many serial entrepreneurs,when talking about the important enlightenment brought by failure to their subsequent entrepreneurship,point out that the size of previous failure will affect the decision of serial entrepreneurs on the size of the organization in the subsequent entrepreneurship.It also highlights the damage that previous failures have done to entrepreneurial reputation of serial entrepreneurs.How,in theory,does previous failure affect serial entrepreneurship? More specifically,how does the size of previous business failure affect the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise? What is the significance of organizational size in a serial entrepreneurial enterprise? Unfortunately,there is little research on serial entrepreneurship.Therefore,there is a lack of theoretical explanation and guidance on the significance of organizational size in serial entrepreneurial activities and how the size of failure affects the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise,which is not conducive to the development of serial entrepreneurial theory and practice.Based on the existing serial entrepreneurial practice and literature,we build a mediation model that the exploration of serial entrepreneurship mediates the relationship between the size of failure and the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise with organizational legitimacy theory.Moreover,we also examine two variables that may moderate the mediating effect: the correlation between the prior enterprise and the current enterprise and the performance of current enterprise.This finally formed the dual-stage moderated mediation model linking previous business failure to the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise.This model makes up for the deficiency of the existing studies on the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise and further enriches the existing studies on serial entrepreneurial enterprise.The paper makes a systematic analysis of the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise in four parts from six chapters.The first part includes the introduction and the literature review.The introduction mainly elaborates the research background,research significance(including theoretical significance and practical significance),research content,research methods and research framework of this paper.The literature review elaborates the existing research from six aspects: entrepreneurial failure,serial entrepreneurship,the relationship between failure and serial entrepreneurship,organizational size,the organizational size of new ventures and the organizational size of serial entrepreneurship.Based on those,we summarize the characteristics and shortcomings of existing studies,and draw the necessity and feasibility of explaining the impact of previous failures on subsequent entrepreneurial activities from the perspective of organizational size.There are three main deficiencies in the existing studies.First,the existing studies on the impact of failure on serial entrepreneurship are limited in number,fail to form a unified framework,and the conclusions are inconsistent,which requires more evidence and perspectives to explain the relationship between the two.Second,existing studies on the consequences of failure mainly discuss the impact of failure on subsequent entrepreneurial activities from the perspective of individuals and external social environment,and lack the perspective of organizational characteristics,such as organizational size.However,the size of failure as an important feature of previously failed enterprise and the cost of failure will have an impact on the serial entrepreneurial efforts of entrepreneurs.Therefore,it is necessary to explore the important role of organizational size in serial entrepreneurship with failure experience.Third,existing studies only focus on the impact of failure on serial entrepreneurial intention and performance,and rarely discuss the impact of failure on specific serial entrepreneurial action.Entrepreneurship is a means-ends process,and entrepreneurial action is a way to achieve their goals.Therefore,it is necessary to explore the influence of failure on serial entrepreneurial action,so as to better reveal the activity trajectory of serial entrepreneurial enterprise.The second part includes the third chapter that elaborates the theoretical basis and hypotheses.First of all,this chapter expounds the theoretical basis of this paperorganizational legitimacy theory,highlights organizational legitimacy is not only a kind of social norms that organization needs to follow,but also a kind of key resources that can be used to obtain other resources.Secondly,this chapter elaborates the important theoretical significance of organizational legitimacy in entrepreneurship,especially in serial entrepreneurship with failure experience from two aspects:(1),new venture faces the dilemma of legitimacy: legitimacy is very important to new venture and is the key factor for new ventures' successes.(2),the legitimacy of serial startups with failures is more limited.In the history of a serial entrepreneur,more than one enterprise has been created.The entrepreneurial reputation of his/her early stage is an important reference for stakeholders to evaluate the legitimacy of serial entrepreneurial enterprise.Previous failure has had a negative impact on the entrepreneurs' reputation,conveying the message that serial entrepreneurial enterprise is of poor quality.Thus,the serial entrepreneurial enterprise may be less legitimate in the eyes of potential stakeholders and less likely to obtain the important resources provided by potential stakeholders.In this way,serial entrepreneur who has experienced failure is more eager to obtain legitimacy in serial entrepreneurship and will be more committed to the efforts to obtain legitimacy.Finally,serial entrepreneur with failure experience will obtain the organizational legitimacy by exploring and then expanding the size of the organization.There are three reasons for this:(1),the size of an organization is an important characteristic of an organization.As an important organizational characteristic of previous entrepreneurial enterprise and an important measure of the cost of failure,the size of failure itself may affect stakeholders' evaluation of the legitimacy of his/her serial entrepreneurial enterprise.Building a large size is a good way for entrepreneur to obtain external support.Serial entrepreneur experiencing failure especially has such motivation.Therefore,the size of failure affects the tendency of serial entrepreneurial enterprise to establish larger organizational size to obtain legitimacy by influencing the degree of legitimacy deficiency of serial entrepreneurial enterprise.(2),serial entrepreneurial enterprise has limited resources and needs to find some way to prepare material resource for the expansion of organizational size.Based on the characteristics of entrepreneurial enterprise,serial entrepreneurial enterprise needs to actively change itself,such as creating new business structures,new business models and other proactive strategic actions to obtain the legitimacy of enterprise.The connotation of exploration is consistent with those proactive strategic actions.Therefore,serial entrepreneurial enterprise with failure experience will take more exploration in serial entrepreneurship due to its serious lack of legitimacy,which will bring material resource for the expansion of organizational size.(3),based on the above theoretical interpretation,this study constructs a mediation model that exploration mediate the relationship between the size of previous failure and the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise.In addition,the organizational legitimacy theory argues that the effective knowledge and path accumulated in relevant activities and the performance record of enterprise affect the legitimacy of enterprise.Such,in this paper,on the basis of the mediation model,considering the first stage and the second stage of the mediation model may be moderated by the correlation between the prior enterprise and the current enterprise and the performance of current enterprise respectively,we build a dual-stage moderated mediation model linking the size of previous failure to the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise.Based on the above theoretical model and the existing literature,we proposes 8 hypotheses corresponding to the theoretical model.The third part includes the fourth chapter and the fifth chapter.The fourth chapter elaborates empirical research design with two aspects: sample and measurement.The sample part mainly introduces the design of the questionnaire and the preliminary investigation.(1),the design of the questionnaire is introduced.(2),it introduces the general situation of sample origin.(3),it introduces the process of data collection and makes descriptive statistical analysis of the effective sample data.Since the theoretical model constructed in this study is a mediation model,and in order to avoid endogenous problems,the data in this study are collected in two time periods,and the time interval between the two collections is one year.Among them,independent variable and mediator are represented by the data collected in 2015,and dependent variable is represented by the data collected in 2016.The measurement part elaborates the measurement of variables.It includes the measurement methods of independent variable,mediator,dependent variable and control variables.The fifth chapter elaborates empirical research results.The empirical research results are mainly supported through the quantitative analysis of four parts.The first part mainly adopts the hierarchical regression method to test hypothesis 1 to hypothesis 4,and the results show that these four hypotheses are supported.That is,the larger the size of past failures,the more likely the serial entrepreneur is to create larger-size organizations in serial entrepreneurship;the correlation between the prior enterprise and the current enterprise moderates the relationship between the size of failure and the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise,such that there is a more positive relationship with lower correlation;the larger the size of failure,the more inclined serial entrepreneurs are to explore in subsequent entrepreneurship;The correlation between the prior enterprise and the current enterprise moderates the relationship between the size of failure and exploration in serial entrepreneurship,such that there is a more positive relationship with lower correlation.The second part mainly adopts the hierarchical regression method to test hypothesis 5 and hypothesis 6,and the results show that these two hypotheses are supported.That is,the more serial entrepreneurial enterprise carries out exploration,the larger organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise will be;the performance of current enterprise moderates the relationship between exploration and the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise,such that there is a more positive relationship with poorer performance of current enterprise.The third part adopts bootstrapping method to test hypothesis 7(namely,the mediation model in this study).The test results show that the hypothesis is supported.That is,the exploration of serial entrepreneurship mediates the relationship between the size of failure and the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise.The fourth part mainly adopts the method of sequential test of coefficient product to test hypothesis 8(namely,the moderated mediation model in this study).The test results show that the hypothesis is supported.That is,the relationship between the size of failure and the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterpris through the exploration of serial entrepreneurial enterprise is moderated by the correlation between the prior enterprise and the current enterprise and the performance of current enterprise at the first and second stages,respectively.In addition,in order to prove the stability of the research conclusion,the robustness test was performed in this study.In this study,the measurement method of dependent variable was changed and the test method for hypothesis 7 was changed from bootstrapping test to hierarchical regression test.The robustness test process and method of other hypotheses were the same as the previous quantitative analysis.The results of the robustness test show that the test results of hypothesis 1 to hypothesis 8 are basically consistent with the test results mentioned above,and the research conclusions in this paper are supported.Therefore,the results of this study are reliable and non-random.The fourth part includes the sixth chapter.This chapter mainly elaborates the conclusion,new perspectives,practical significance,limitations and the future research prospects of this study.Based on the above analysis,this paper puts forward the following new perspectives.Firstly,this study explores the relationship between the size of failure and the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterpris,and the essence of which is to explore the consequences of failure.The existing literature on the consequences of failure rarely focuses on the organizational characteristics of previous failed enterprise and the influence mechanism of that characteristic on the organizational characteristic of subsequent entrepreneurial enterprise.The size of failure,as an important characteristic of past organization,reflects the cost of failure and has an impact on the subsequent entrepreneurial efforts of entrepreneurs.In addition,establishing a large organizational size is a good way for entrepreneurs to obtain external support.Serial entrepreneur experiencing failure especially has such motivation.Based on the organizational legitimacy theory,we predicted and found that the larger size of failure brings more serious damage to serial entrepreneurs' entrepreneurial reputation,which makes the legitimacy of serial entrepreneurial enterprise more insufficient,which makes them more inclined to obtain legitimacy by expanding organizational size.This constructs the relationship model of failure size influencing the size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise.The establishment of this model makes up for the lack of organizational size perspective in the existing studies on the consequences of failure,and is also a beneficial attempt to enrich the existing studies on the consequences of failure.Secondly,this study explores the important role of exploration in the context of severe lack of legitimacy,and constructs the relationship model between failure and specific serial entrepreneurial actions.Existing studies emphasize the influence of previous experience on subsequent entrepreneurial intention and performance,but seldom explore the influence of previous experience on subsequent entrepreneurial action.Given that entrepreneurship is a means-ends process,the logical sequence should be that previous experience affects subsequent entrepreneurial actions and hence subsequent entrepreneurial performance.The relationship between failure and serial entrepreneurial performance remains a black box without specific serial entrepreneurial actions.Exploring the impact of failure on serial entrepreneurial action can better understand the dynamics,impact intensity and scope of previous experiences on subsequent entrepreneurial activities.This is necessary to understand the phenomenon of serial entrepreneurship.Based on the theory of legitimacy,this study finds that exploration may be more effective in the context of severe lack of legitimacy of entrepreneurial enterprise.Serious lack of legitimacy makes enterprises need to change the status quo and promote the acquisition of legitimacy in a more likely way.Exploration helps enterprises to seek and establish an image that can better meet the demands of stakeholders and help enterprises to obtain legitimacy.This enriches existing research on serial entrepreneurial action.Thirdly,this paper discusses the organizational size of entrepreneurial enterprise,and constructs a model in which the size of failure indirectly affects the size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise through exploration.Existing research on organizational size focuses on established enterprises.Compared with those enterprises,new ventures have many liabilities and characteristics,which make the two kinds of enterprises have great differences in resources and challenges.Therefore,the research conclusions on the organizational size of established enterprises are not necessarily applicable to new ventures.This study focuses on the organizational size of new ventures,and finds that the size of failure not only directly affects the organizational size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise,but also indirectly influences the size of serial entrepreneurial enterprise through exploration.Based on the characteristics of entrepreneurial enterprise,this study reveals the important role of organizational size in entrepreneurial activities,especially serial entrepreneurial activities,which enriches the existing studies on organizational size.In addition,previous studies on organizational size have emphasized the impact of initial size and the current size of organization on organizational actions,survival and development.In this study,the important role of organizational size was discussed from a longer time dimension.The results of this paper show that not only the initial size of the enterprise will have an impact on the organizational action,survival and development,but also the the size of related activities before the establishment of the current organization will have an important impact on the current organization's action,survival and development.This enriches existing organizational size research. |
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