Renewing the hunt for the heffalump: Identifying potential entrepreneurs by personality characteristics

Abstract

This article discusses research on how society can identify and encourage potential entrepreneurs under the Innovation Center Experiment of the U.S. National Science Foundation at the University of Oregon. Another researcher, Candace Borland, studied the locus of control, nAch, and entrepreneurship at the University of Texas. In her work, Borland used two inventorieswhich have been validated. One was Lynn's Achievement Motivation Questionnaire (nAch), and theother, Levenson's Locus of Control Scales.'° The results of the Oregon Alumni Survey disagree with Borland's findings concerning internal locus of control. However, this research tends to confirm her findings that nAch is not the most important variable for predicting likelihood of starting a business. Oregon's results from the nAch scale seem to be more negative than Borland's. Further, it appears that Levenson's Internal Locus of Control Scale may be of little practical value as a means of identifying entrepreneurial types.