Entrepreneurial ideation: Effects of morphology and complexity

Abstract

Studies of product architecture identify a mirroring process between the product and the organisation. Parallel, empirical studies of effectual entrepreneurship show an accumulation of commitments between stakeholders while negotiating the features of the product in a similar fashion to product mirroring. This paper presents a study that looks at the effects of mirroring architectural complexity in early stages of entrepreneurship. The survey asked participants to interpret parametrically generated artefacts with the purpose of starting a new firm. Responses were analysed for complexity in the lexical semantic structure of ideas. Results show that the effects of artefact complexity are not as straightforward as hypothesised and provide evidence that suggests an important role of artefact morphology in entrepreneurial ideation. These findings support a model of product architecture mirroring that is filtered by design morphology.