Task Re-allocation in New Venture Teams: A Team Conflict Perspective

Abstract

This study contributes a novel perspective on how new venture teams navigate task re-allocation during the new venture development phase. It highlights the relevance of task re-allocation conflict, shows how “negative affect expectations” shape the unfolding of such conflicts, and demonstrates why acting out conflict and its associated negative affect can enable team members to make substantial task re-allocations instead of symbolic ones. The analysis has implications for two bodies of research, which have previously not been considered in tandem: (1) research on task (re-)allocation, professionalization, and structural imprinting in new ventures, and (2) research on team conflict.

Fulfilling the process promise in new venture creation research: The ethnography/accelerator approach

“…Accelerators are particularly valuable because their selection procedures and screening criteria create a homogenous sample in terms of the characteristics of the entrepreneurs and the ventures (Assenova, 2020;Cohen, Fehder, et al, 2019). For instance, Brattström (2023) To create a sample of ventures that share relatively similar characteristics, ethnographers should survey the composition of the cohorts according to the objectives of the accelerator. Notably, the pre-knowledge of the ventures they gain at fieldwork inception provides valuable leads to achieve this goal.…”

“…Depending on their research questions, ethnographers may also want to build a social role with the entrepreneurs of different cohorts (Brattström, 2023; Morlacchi, 2021). Yet researchers rarely unpack the “how to” of their participation (Gidley et al, 2022; Karp, 2022; Krishnan et al, 2021).…”

“…Accelerators are particularly valuable because their selection procedures and screening criteria create a homogenous sample in terms of the characteristics of the entrepreneurs and the ventures (Assenova, 2020; Cohen, Fehder, et al, 2019). For instance, Brattström (2023) studied how the work taking place among members of three entrepreneurial teams in the information and communication technology industry shaped the development of new organizations at a Danish six‐month acceleration program. Particularly important for her research goals was ensuring that the teams shared contextual conditions (e.g., industry, product type); aspirations (e.g., scaling); compositional characteristics (e.g., team size); and development stages.…”

“…This is vital for NVC research, which has long been subject to excessive heterogeneity across cases (Davidsson & Gruenhagen, 2021; Shepherd et al, 2021). Accelerators target ventures at specific development stages and from similar industries (e.g., Brattström, 2023; Karp, 2022), training cohorts of entrepreneurs who engage in similar social processes and shared challenges (e.g., Cohen, Bingham, & Hallen, 2019; Krishnan et al, 2021). These features allow for creating large and homogeneous samples by expanding the number of ventures subject to data collection in a single site (e.g., Karp, 2022).…”

“…First, accelerators provide access to cohorts of very early stage ventures sharing similar characteristics (e.g., Dumont, 2023a; Karp, 2022; Krishnan et al, 2021). Second, accelerators allow real‐time, longitudinal observation of the kind of entrepreneurial work that typically takes place out of sight (e.g., Brattström, 2023; Gidley et al, 2022). Third, accelerators offer a space for social action by gathering multiple stakeholders around entrepreneurs (e.g., Goswami et al, 2018; Miller et al, 2023).…”