From Negative Emotions to Personal Growth: Failure and Re-entry into Entrepreneurship

Abstract

This study explores how entrepreneurs’ extent of experience of business failure affects the level of negative emotional response (NER) they experience, moderating the level of personal growth that occurs after business failure. Contrary to common assumption, the study finds no significant relationship between the extent of failure experience and the level of NER. The results show that many entrepreneurs demonstrate personal growth following business failure, however, the extent of failure experience and the level of NER. This interaction moderates the level of personal growth for the entrepreneur and suggests that high levels of failure experience interfere with the level of personal growth obtained. The study contributes to theory by providing insights into the processes and consequences of entrepreneurial failure. In particular, the study brings together key threads of debate on personal growth and failure to develop and test conceptual arguments, and further explores the way entrepreneurship scholars think about emotion, business failure and its impact on the individual and society.