Millennial entrepreneurial persistence under harsh contextual environments in Iran

Abstract

Millennial Iranian entrepreneurs, as an emerging business class, face new realities rarely seen in other countries due to the harsh and uncertain contextual environment. As young and dynamic entrepreneurs, they want to build independent careers by developing new start-up businesses to address the social and economic needs of the masses and, at the same time, to earn an income to ensure their economic survival. However, given the difficult business environment with domestic challenges and international embargos, these entrepreneurs find themselves faced with many problematic issues. Therefore, this research is based on the concept of entrepreneurial persistence for survival and aims to investigate how Iranian millennial entrepreneurs develop businesses in a difficult contextual environment. A new conceptual framework and a number of propositions for future research have been offered in this study on the basis of the findings. Implications for policy and practices are also discussed with the focus on possible policy reform, better entrepreneurial education as well as other incentives to support millennial entrepreneurs.

The Role of Entrepreneurship in Economic Resilience

“…Alsharif et al (2021) stress the significance of managing uncertainty and reallocating resources effectively for sustainable economic performance, particularly in times of crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, Bagheri & Zhu (2022) focus on millennial entrepreneurial persistence in challenging environments, such as in Iran, highlighting the central theme of survival in uncertain conditions.…”