The Small Business Institute ® and Transaction Cost Economics

Abstract

Faculty in entrepreneurship and small business have many options available to gain experience, ideas, and beneficial information in order to succeed in research, the classroom, and program development. Due to the highly competitive nature of higher education and the constantly evolving field of entrepreneurship education and small business facilitation, the ability to find and implement the best ideas and filter out those that are not as useful can be a daunting task. Through the lens of transaction cost theory, this paper proposes the idea that utilizing an organization such as the Small Business Institute ® can help eliminate the search and information costs, bargaining and decision costs, and policy and enforcement costs associated with finding and implementing the best ideas and innovations. A personal testimony of the beneficial experience of connection with the Small Business Institute concludes the paper.