Business Incubator Managers’ Perceptions of their Role and Performance Success: Role Demands, Constraints, and Choices

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/emre.12379
• Date: 01 June 2020
• Published date: 01 June 2020

Business Incubator Managers’Perceptions of

their Role and Performance Success: Role

Demands, Constraints, and Choices

NADA KAKABADSE,

1

MINE KARATAS-OZKAN,

2

NICHOLAS THEODORAKOPOULOS,

3

DRCARMEL MCGOWAN

4

and DR.KATE RI NA NICOLOPOU LOU

5

1

Professor of Policy, Governance and Ethics Henley Business School Greenlands Henley onThames, RG9 3AU

2

Chair in Strategy and Entrepreneurship Southampton Business School University of Southampton Southampton, SO17 1BJ

3

Professor of Entrepreneurship Development Aston Business SchoolBirmingham

4

Senior Tutor in Business Systems Strategy and Management University of Bedfordshire University

5

Hunter Centre for Entrepreneurship University of Strat Clyde

Using Stewart’s(1976a, 1976b) roleframework as an analytical lens,this paper examines howbusiness incubator

managers perceive their roleand performance, and the choicesthey make in dealing with constraints and competing

demands. Giventhat the literature in this domainhas not considered how these typesof managers experience agency

and structurein their role, this study isimportant in theory and practice terms. Drawing on 40 qualitative interviews

in different UK regions, the findings demonstrate the ways in which business incubator managers see their role as

pivotal in supporting the incubatee entrepreneurs and how they endeavour to address competing role demands

against constraints. Notably, while funding is commonly viewed as an enabler, the findings suggestthat the funding

structurecould act as a constraint on the incubatormanagers, due to the weight of perceivedbureaucracy preventing

the latter from operating effectively within the full remit of their role.

Keywords: Entrepreneurs; Entrepreneurship; Strategy; Autonomy; Organizational; Structures; Organization;

leadership; Human; Resources, Organization

Introduction and research gap

A growing body of literature argues that the business

incubationcan support the development of businessskills,

networks, and access to coaching and mentoring, along

with providing a wide range of support services in order

to help the incubatee entrepreneurs take their business

forward, and minimise the risk of potential failure

setting (Barrow, 2001; McAdam and Marlow, 2007;

Al-Mubaraki and Busler, 2013; Wonglimpiyarat, 2016;

Zhang et al., 2016). In that regard, the incubator

manager–incubatee relationshipis critical in adding value

(Fry, 1987; Udell, 1990; Autio and Klofsten, 1998;

Sherman, 1999), with a number of studies (e.g. Lalkaka,

2002; Hackett and Dilts, 2004) specifically

acknowledging the incubator manager as the key success

factor for business start-ups. Research has also shown

the significance of the incubator manager in attracting

suitable incubatee entrepreneurs and assisting them as

their business develops, while handling the funders’

compliance requirements (Prokopenko and Pavlin, 1991;

Rouach et al., 2010; Meru and Struwig, 2015).

Nonetheless, the literature, apart from a few exceptions

(Allen and Bazan,1990; Duff, 2000; Patton, 2014),offers

little in-depth investigation of the incubator manager’s

role in impacting the start-up’s success or failure.

Moreover, researchers have paid little, if any, attention to

the individualincubator manager’s perceptionof their role

in performance successand how they attempt to deal with

job demands and constraints in fulfilling their role. This

represents a significant gap in knowledge.

Given the importance of the topic and dearth of studies

in this area, our approach generates two interrelated

research questions: first, how do incubator managers

perceive their role, and performance success? Second,

how do incubator managers deal with perceived job

demands and constraints? In order to address the above,

the paper examines how the incubator managers perceive

Correspondence: Nada Kakadse, Professor of Policy, Governance and

Ethics Henley Business School Greenlands Henley on Thames RG9

3AU. E-mailn.kakabadse@reading.ac.uk

European Management Review, Vol. 17, 485–498, (2020)

DOI: 10.1111/emre.12379

©2020 European Academy of Management