Entrepreneurship development policymaking factors: An exploratory survey of tourism in Iran

Abstract

Widespread presence of small and medium enterprise (SME) and entrepreneurial businesses (EB) as well as governments’ key role in tourism sphere, especially in developing countries. As a result, the importance of policymaking in SME and EB has been growing through last decade. This study is trying to identify and prioritize the factors influencing SME and EB policy in Iran tourism scope. For this research, data were collected via exploratory mixed method in two steps. Firstly, qualitative techniques such as literature review has been done to find all scholarly work and then using qualitative content analysis, factors influencing SME policy in tourism has been identified. In second step, quantitative methods, namely survey and Statistical techniques were used for analysis. Population of this study comprised policymaking and tourism entrepreneurship experts of Iran. The survey results showed there were 40 variables into six factors under two main dimensions influence on SME and EB. Factors indentified in this study can be used to formulate macro policies in the tourism industry and national policymakers can utilize these concepts for entrepreneurship and SME's development in tourism. This research contributes to the existing literature in the field of entrepreneurship policymaking by introduce a systematic framework. This new framework can provide better insights and inform thinking in the area of entrepreneurship policymaking.