Migrant entrepreneurs on Dutch markets : Focusing on opportunity recognition process.

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Master’s Thesis

Migrant entrepreneurs on Dutch markets.

Focusing on opportunity recognition

process.

University of Amsterdam

Faculty of Economics and Business MSc Business Studies

By: Maxim Goroshkov Student Number: 10395938

First Supervisor: Dr. Tsvi Vinig

Second Supervisor: Dr. Wietze van der Aa

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Abstract

This research study presents the analysis of factors, which influence the migrant’s opportunity recognition process on the Dutch market. There is a research gap, as many researches studied the question of an opportunity recognition in general, but few of them studied the factors, which influence migrant’s ORP. The main aim of this research paper is to define group of factors, which influence on opportunity

recognition process in general and to find out which are more influential on the

migrant’s ORP. Moreover, the current research will examine the Dutch market, as it is considered to be one of the most friendly markets, due to formal and informal systems. The research paper will examine the model of factors influence, and, due to

qualitative research analysis provide significant factors and the answer, which of them are more important and which are less.

Key words: opportunity recognition, migrant, minor, Dutch market, entrepreneurship, factors

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CHAPTER I - Introduction

The 21st century can be called a “Global century” and we live in a time, when everybody has great opportunities to choose where to live, work, and start his own business or a start-up. Because of this, this century can also be called a century of entrepreneurship and opportunities.

Nowadays, each person in the world is faced a great number of opportunities. They can come up in sports, at school, and even while cooking. Each day a great number of new start-ups are launched. But not everyone is able to recognize these opportunities and become an entrepreneur.

This research paper is devoted to the question migrant opportunity recognition processes (ORP), and to factors, which influence the entrepreneurial opportunity recognition process. For many years different researchers have been arguing about different topics and themes, connected with entrepreneurship, factors, and main abilities of an ideal entrepreneur, but rarely, they argued about one thing: that opportunity recognition plays the main, fundamental, core, basic or even key aspect of the entrepreneurial process. So, many of the researchers tried to understand the process of opportunity recognition and to understand key factors, which influence the success of opportunity evaluation. They made attempts to estimate which factors are more important and which are less.

The end of the 20th century and first years of the 21st century were devoted to the question of the opportunity recognition process in the perspective of entrepreneurial process (Shane, 2000, Shane & Eckhardt, 2003), where they find out and prove the fact, that ORP is a core and key process for entrepreneurs. Later on, based on these articles, researches try to estimate factors, which influence on success of ORP and create concepts, models and frameworks (Ardichvili & Cardozo, 2000, Ardichvili et al., 2003). Over the last several years, researches tried to look at the ORP as a part of global and international entrepreneurship (Kontinen, 2010, Butler, 2010) and build their own models and try to find out factors which influence the international

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opportunity recognition process, through the perspective of internationalization. But nobody tried to find out the factors which have an impact on the ORP of migrant entrepreneurs.

The topic of the thesis is “Migrant entrepreneurs on Dutch markets. Focusing on factors of opportunity recognition process”. That is why, the current paper will consist of three main parts: opportunity recognition process (ORP), factors which influence on ORP and migrant entrepreneurship.

Opportunity recognition process

Opportunity recognition process is supposed to be the core process and is considered to become the fundamental topic of this research. The basic entrepreneurial opportunity definition is the situation in which new goods, services, raw materials, markets and organizing methods can be introduced through the formation of new means, ends, or means-ends relationships (Shane & Eckharts, 2003). In other words, opportunity recognition is a process, where entrepreneurs find the ability to create his own venture and to add his own value.

As it was mentioned above, opportunity recognition process is the theory which wasn’t strongly argued or discussed, but became the starting point for many researches to work on this topic and discover other new fields, focusing on the fact, that OR is a key process for entrepreneurs.

Factors for ORP

According to the first articles about the ORP until nowadays a great number of researches have created several models of ORP, studied great number of factors and prerequisites which have impact on this process. The first factors which were screened were creativity, asymmetry of information, networking and prior knowledge (Shane, 2000, Shane & Eckhardt, 2003). But, there are two successful models and frameworks, which examined the question of factors, which have an influence on the ORP. Opportunity recognition process model consists of 5 main factors: entrepreneurial alertness, extend social networks, prior knowledge about market, customer and customer problems, and creativity (Ardichvili & Cardozo, 2000). It was the first big model for estimating the connection between ORP and this factors. After

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this model, Ardichvili broadened it to four main groups of factors: personal, social networks, prior knowledge and entrepreneurial alertness which influenced on core process of Opportunity Recognition (OR) (Ardichvili et.al., 2003). All groups consist of several factors.

As a result, the Framework of Opportunity centered Entrepreneurship came about. It consists of four main stages: creating and exploring opportunity, planning to realize the opportunity, acting on opportunity and personal entrepreneurship, with an entrepreneurial OR in the center of a framework. Each stage included different factors and questions.

So, those two frameworks have things in common and some different parts, but they all include major factors or groups of factors, which impact on ORP.

Of course, there were other researches, who analyzed influence of exact factors, such as education (Arenius et.al., 2005), social sources of information (Ozgen et.al., 2007) and the impact of genetic perspectives (Nicolaou et.al., 2009) All important factors will be included into the model of current research paper.

From general ORP to migrant ORP

The concept of globalization and international entrepreneurship also played a significant role and couldn’t be ignored in the discussion of opportunity recognition. Mainly, at the end of the 20th century and beginning of 21st century, many domestic ventures tried to find opportunities outside the boundaries of their domestic markets and to become first entrepreneurs on emerging markets. That is why, many researches continued defining the ORP, but they changed the perspective from a general definition for domestic markets to international markets.

Thus, factors such as network ties in the international ORP (Kontinen, 2010), uncertainty, risks and prior knowledge about the market and customers problems (Butler, 2010) were studied in last few years. However, there is one problem in the focus of these studies: they examine factors and their impact focusing on internationalization. So, Kontinen and Butler looked at existing domestic ventures, which tried to find opportunities on new markets outside the region.

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If we look through major studies about migrant entrepreneurship in Europe and, especially, on Dutch markets, we will find some models and factors, which try to describe the entrepreneurial behavior of migrant entrepreneurs. Rarely, they are devoted to ORP. And none of these studies try to combine migrant entrepreneurship and factors for ORP, that is why this gap has to be removed during current research.

The relevance, actuality, and interest of this thesis are connected with two main things. First, due to the latest findings, the number of migrant entrepreneurs on Dutch market is relatively more than native one and the number of migrant entrepreneurs grew more rapidly than native one. From 1999-2004, the number of migrant entrepreneurs grew 44%, while the increase of native entrepreneurs was only 2%.

Second, the main aim of current research is to fill in the gap in the studies, as there are no other articles or researches devoted to these factors, which influence on a migrant ORP, which will help to understand the entrepreneurial behavior of migrant entrepreneurs and to find out their main advantages and disadvantages.

The importance and interest of this topic is really relevant to today, as one in five businesses is set in the Netherlands by migrant entrepreneurs (Nijkamp, Sahin and Baycan-Levent, 2009). Also, in the 21st century many people move away from their native countries, where they have really high barriers to become employees, that is why, the majority of them are more likely to become self-employed and work for themselves. That is why, it is becoming more common for local entrepreneurs to become in touch with migrant entrepreneurs and have to compete, not only among themselves, but also, with migrant entrepreneurs, who have their own weaknesses and strengthens.

Central Question

How do migrant entrepreneurs recognise opportunities? What factors influence the migrant’s opportunity recognition process, in the case of the Netherlands?

To help answer the central question, supporting sub-questions are made: 1) Is networking an important factor for migrant’s ORP?

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2) Which type (source) of prior knowledge has more influence on a migrant’s ORP?

3) Which personal traits of character influence migrant’s ORP? 4) Which other factors have influence on migrant’s ORP?

5) What factors are more important for the ORP and which factors have no influence on migrant’s OPR?

6) Why migrants choose Dutch market for entrepreneurship?

Through multiple case-study method this paper aims to uncover the influence of different factors on opportunity recognition process of the main groups of entrepreneurs: migrant.

Sample

The sample consists of migrant entrepreneurs who had or have their own business on the Dutch market. The size for survey should be at least 10 case studies with migrant entrepreneurs. A migrant entrepreneur is an entrepreneur, who wasn’t born in Holland, but moved to the Netherlands and started his own venture or a start-up. The motivation for coming to the Netherlands is not relevant.

The paper is structured in the following way. The first part is a literature analysis chapter, during which all background information needed to answer the research question will be studied. Then a methodology section outlining choices to opt for a qualitative type of study, where process of data collection and data analysis are described. An extensive summary of the findings is presented, followed by the discussion that draws on the most important results as well as implications and limitations. And, finally, the chapter devoted to main conclusions. The paper finishes with bibliography and appendix with standard interview questions at the very end.

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CHAPTER II - Literature analysis

Opportunity recognition process

The topic of opportunity recognition process in entrepreneurship has been studied for the past century, of course, a lot of different researchers have created their own definitions, ergo there are different types of entrepreneurship. To be clear, here are main definitions of the ORP, entrepreneurship and migrant entrepreneurship, which will be used for this thesis.

The ORP appears to include three distinct processes: (1) sensing or perceiving market needs and/or underemployed resources, (2) recognizing or discovering a “fit” between particular market needs and specified resources, and (3) creating a new “fit” between heretofore separate needs and resources in the form of a business concept. These processes represent, respectively, perception, discovery, and creation — not simply “recognition” (Ardichvili, Cardozo and Ray, 2003). But, opportunity development and opportunity recognition are two distinct processes (Ardichvili and Cardozo, 2000). So, there is also an opportunity development process, but, for this thesis, the recognition is considered to be the main part.

The last main definition for this paper is a definition of migrant entrepreneurship. Migrant entrepreneurship is an entrepreneurship lead by migrants, people who were born in another country and who have moved away from their native country to another and started their own business in another country.

For the past 30 years, a great number of theories in entrepreneurship have sought to explain entrepreneurship as a function of the types of people engaged in entrepreneurial activity, and that is why many researchers have largely overlooked the role of opportunities. And all of them considered identifying and selecting right opportunities for new business as among the most important abilities of a successful entrepreneur. Some researchers have tended to take a person-centric perspective, in which entrepreneurship depends on stable, enduring differences among people rather than differences in the information they possess about the presence of opportunities (Shane, Eckhardt, 2003).

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Ardichvili, Cardozo also find out that entrepreneurial opportunities can't be exploited by optimizing because the set of alternatives in introducing new things is unknown. And, while non-entrepreneurial decisions maximize scarce resources across previously developed means and ends, entrepreneurs involve the creation of new ends and means previously undetected or unutilized by market participants (Ardichvili, Cardozo, 2000).

The information asymmetry that creates opportunities in the first place is subsequently reduced by the diffusion of information about the opportunity (Shane and Eckhardt, 2003).

But, as it is described in the article (Shane, Eckhardt, 2003), different researchers assume, that opportunity recognition process is not only the result of information asymmetry, but also a result of changes in a variety of parts of the value chain. Furthermore, Schumpeter suggested five different opportunities in changing: those that stem from the creation of new products or services, those that stem from the discovery of new geographical markets, those that emerge from the creation or discovery of new raw materials, those that emerge from new methods of production, and those that are generated from new ways of organizing (Shane and Eckhardt, 2003).

Other studies are also based on several findings about the ORP. In general, to find out the main studies, which can be considered the fundamental in this research paper, approaches from three main schools will be described and compared.

Three main schools of researchers are: Neoclassical economists, psychologists, and Austrian economists. First of all, neoclassical economists have proposed equilibrium theories of entrepreneurship, thus, they assume, that markets are composed of maximizing agents whose collective decisions about prices clear markets. Also, in the equilibrium framework, no one can discover an opportunity that would generate an entrepreneurial profit because, at any point in time, all opportunities have been recognized and all transactions perfectly coordinated, as in equilibrium theory, people are not allowed to recognize opportunities that other don’t see. In general, equilibrium

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theories assume that (1) everyone can recognize all entrepreneurial opportunities, and (2) fundamental attributes of people, rather than information about opportunities, determine who becomes an entrepreneur. For example, Khilstrom and Laffont's model proposes that people with a greater taste for uncertainty will choose to become entrepreneurs, whereas people with a lesser taste for uncertainty will choose to become employees (Shane, 2000).

Frankly speaking, It’s clear that neoclassical economists, who follow the theory of equilibrium are far from reality, as all people in the world can meet and find different opportunities.

The second school, which tried to analyze the ORP and provide a fundamental definition, were psychologists. They have proposed theories which state entrepreneurship is a characteristic possessed by some people and not others. That is why such traits of character, need for achievement of results, willingness to bear risks, self-efficacy, etc. lead some people and not others to become entrepreneurs. Their framework generally focuses on the decision to exploit opportunities rather than on their discovery (Venkataraman 1997). That is why, the ability for opportunity recognition is also linked with personal traits of character. To summarize, psychological theories assume that (1) fundamental attributes of people, rather than information about opportunities, determine who becomes an entrepreneur; and (2) this process depends on people's ability and willingness to take action.

Finally, the last school from the list above is the school of Austrian economists. They believed that equilibrium approaches fail to offer a satisfying theoretical framework for understanding market processes. They assumed, that the theory can’t suppose equilibrium, but theory has to describe the process, how to achieve the equilibrium from non-equilibrium conditions. As all other researchers, Austrians assumed that all the people have different information, which helps them to see different opportunities, which others can’t see.

To briefly summarize, (1) Austrians consider that everyone has different information, which helps to see other opportunities. And (2) due to these opportunities, everyone can become an entrepreneur.

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With regard to neoclassical approach to the ORP and entrepreneurship, it can be said, that it is far from reality. Talking about psychologists and Austrians, it’s better to make a combination from two approaches and to find differences and similarities, to assume the theory based on personal traits of character and on asymmetry of information to form the approach for the current research paper.

Of course, the Austrian perspective can be considered most important with regard to the ORP, mainly because its framework provides different explanations for the discovery, exploitation, and organization of entrepreneurial opportunities from other frameworks.

First, Austrian economics doesn’t view the process of opportunity recognition as mechanical. If any given entrepreneur can’t necessarily discover more than one commercial application for any given technological change, then entrepreneurs can’t actively select between alternative opportunities (Kirzner 1985).

Second, Austrians believe that the possession of information that is appropriate to a particular opportunity leads to opportunity recognition, and they don’t believe that anyone is more likely than anyone else to become an entrepreneur across all opportunities.

Third, unlike both neoclassical economics and psychology, Austrian economics considers opportunity exploitation to be endogenous to opportunity discovery.

Lastly, the Austrian explanation for entrepreneurship generates different implications from the other two frameworks for who becomes an entrepreneur, how entrepreneurial efforts are organized in the economy, and how the government can influence the entrepreneurial process.

If we rely only on the Austrian’s framework, it can be seen that they forget about important things, which are a part of psychologist’s theory. Thus, it can be mentioned, that Austrians consider, that none is more likely than another to become an entrepreneur and to recognize an opportunity. But, the 21st century gives us another example: there is a link between finding an opportunity and becoming an

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entrepreneur. All people are different, and have different traits of character, motivations and conditions. That is why the psychologist’s theory is needed to prove the fact, that there are different factors, which influence both on ORP and on the willingness to become an entrepreneur.

In conclusion, that opportunity recognition process is supposed to be the main process for all entrepreneurs. Different people, due to information asymmetry and other factors, can find different opportunities, but even this is not proof that each person who recognizes an opportunity will become an entrepreneur; not each entrepreneur finds a unique opportunity. So, it is assumed that different people see different opportunities, which is linked with different group of factors and ORP is the main process in entrepreneurship.

ORP has been clarified for entrepreneurs in general. But, before this discussion can be furthered, it has to be clarified what is migrant entrepreneurship, what is the main difference between entrepreneurs in general and migrant entrepreneurs, how they find opportunities. This is explained in the next subchapter.

Migrant entrepreneurship

From a global perspective, many people are on the move; international migration has become a key feature of a modern open society (Gorter, Nijkamp, and Poot 1998). Of course, migration is sometimes connected with negative economical changes, as society gains a low-paid labor, which works more efficiently than local employees with higher salaries. But still, migration touches all countries in the world. According to the latest findings, there are more than 230 million migrants all over the world, making migrants 5% of the total global population.

All migrants come in contact with a vast variety of problems. The most relevant personal characteristics mentioned in many studies that explain why migrants become self-employed are: the lower education level of migrants put them in a less favored position in society, which ultimately results in a high level of unemployment among migrant communities. The creation of firms by migrants is also a reaction to other negative factors, such as job discrimination, language barriers or poorly paid jobs,

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which all go to explain the increasing number of ethnic firms in certain geographical areas.

The existence of migrant and social networks also plays a major role in their motivation, because it encourages migrants to start their own businesses. In general, migrants are more likely to be self-employed than similarly skilled, native-born workers. This is why self-employment rates of migrants exceed those of native-born citizens in many countries (Baycan-Levent and Nijkamp, 2009).

The entrepreneurial behavior of many migrant groups has led to the rise of a new phenomenon called ‘migrant entrepreneurship’ or ‘ethnic entrepreneurship’. Migrant entrepreneurship has played a crucial role in increasing the employment opportunities for ethnic segments in urban populations, and in resolving social tensions and problems.

According to Baycon-Levent’s article, migrant entrepreneurs are a heterogeneous group of businessmen and women and may differ in orientation, motivation, and economic performance. Migrants are motivated to opt for entrepreneurship in order to be independent, to be their own boss (propensity to take risks), to have extra income (profit), to gain some work experience, or to maintain family tradition; or they are dissatisfied with their previous job, need flexibility, want to make a career, or have ideological reasons (desire to innovate) or leadership qualities.

Of course, there are different migrants. Mainly, migrants differ in terms of motivation for migration, their native language, religion, level of education, their country of birth, demographic background, networking with other migrants, access to family business and other factors.

Even more, migration led to the study of migrant embeddedness. And, in the end of the 20th century, Granovetter went beyond that and he has distinguished two types of embeddedness: relational and structural embeddedness. Relational embeddedness refers to ‘economic actors’ and involves personal relations with one another. Migrant entrepreneurs are thus embedded in a concrete network of social relations with customers, suppliers, banks, competitors, and law enforcers. Structural embeddedness

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relates to the broader network to which these actors belong. Also, there is a so-called mixed embeddedness, which is important for the exact thesis, as, mixed embeddness is considered to be the main feature of migrants in the Netherlands (Baycan-Levent and Nijkamp, 2009)

As it has been mentioned above, migrants are more likely to become entrepreneurs, than native ones. Whether, they become entrepreneurs, they should find opportunities for their ventures and start-ups. As it is known, opportunities occur in markets and there has to be a sufficient demand for a certain bundle of products otherwise no entrepreneur can make a living. So, it can be assumed, that migrant’s ORP is much more easier, than the ORP in general, as migrants have just to find a market with some demand. In other words, migrant entrepreneurs have much lower requests.

Talking about ORP in general and making a comparison with migrant’s ORP, it is clear, that they have no difference, but still, have a huge difference in motivation, factors, approach and requests to looking for an opportunity. Migrant entrepreneurs have to find an opportunity to start their own business, without having any alternatives, if they want to stay abroad, while native entrepreneurs, often, continue looking for something new after they already found an idea. It goes without saying, that migrant entrepreneurs not only can, but create new and innovative start-ups, which local entrepreneurs can’t even mention.

Factors for ORP

During the literature analysis, many factors, studied for the last 30 years were analyzed to find out, which of them, can be sufficient for a special target audience, as migrant entrepreneurs and to find out, how migrant entrepreneurs find opportunities, why they are successful and, finally, to understand their advantages and disadvantages.

Austrian’s theory describes that all people are different and can see different opportunities, a common theme in much researches on opportunity recognition, however, has been the suggestion that information plays a crucial role in this process. And, as Shane mentions, access to relevant information plays a crucial role in the ORP, and can differ depending on the source (Shane 2000).

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So, what are the main factors for the ORP in general? First of all, many researchers point out networking as one of the most important factors for the ORP. Networks are mainly divided into two groups: with weak and strong ties. Entrepreneurs, who have extended networks (have more weak ties), identify more opportunities, as they have an access to more sources of information (Ardichvili and Cardozo, 2000). Instead Ozgen and Baron in their study consider, that people, who have mentors (strong ties) advance not only in their careers more rapidly, but also achieve greater recognitions, than those, who don’t have (Ozgen and Baron, 2007). Finally, in the argues between weak and strong ties, Arenius and Clercq find out, that people with more weak ties are more likely to recognize opportunities, but strong ties provide entrepreneurs with higher quality of information (Arenius and Clercq, 2013). In other words, the greater networking entrepreneur has, the more information he gets, and more opportunities can be found out, but the quality of the information can be tested through the strong ties: friends, parents or other close people.

Also, Ardichvili, Cardozo along with Ozgen and Baron see the link between networking and entrepreneurial alertness (Ardichvili and Cardozo, 2000; Ozgen and Baron, 2007). Ardichvili and Cardozo argue, that networking stress the importance of entrepreneurial alertness, while Ozgen and Baron underline, that mentors can help to make entrepreneurs more alert to new business opportunities.

This can be also a hypothesis, if weak ties stress the importance of entrepreneurial alertness, or strong ties helps to be more alert, or, networking has no influence on entrepreneurial alertness.

Networking is an extremely interesting factor for a migrant’s ORP, which has to be included into model and tested during the case study.

Ardichvili and Cardozo define entrepreneurial alertness (awareness) as, a propensity to notice and be sensitive to information about objects, incidents and patterns of behavior in the environment, with special sensitivity to maker and user problems, unmet needs and interest, and novel combination of resources (Ardichvili and

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Cardozo, 2000). In other words, the higher EA is, the higher is the likelihood for the opportunity recognition.

Entrepreneurial alertness can be formed in two groups: entrepreneurs, who find the opportunity “accidentally”, and who have undergone a formal search. Ardichvili and Cardozo tested, that entrepreneurs, who found an opportunity “accidentally” achieve break-even results faster (Ardichvili and Cardozo, 2000).

Entrepreneurial alertness is not really efficient for migrant entrepreneurs, as they are mostly limited in time to look for variety of opportunities, as they need money for living. Still, it can be tested, whether migrant entrepreneurs continue to look for additional opportunities or start to develop the recognized idea. .

The other source of information is a prior knowledge. Frankly speaking, prior knowledge is met in many research papers and is definitely supposed to be one of the main factors for the ORP.

Shane maintains that any entrepreneur will discover only those opportunities, related to his or her prior knowledge (Shane, 2000). Prior knowledge is also considered to be a so-called “corridor”, where entrepreneur can recognize an opportunity (Ardichvili and Cardozo, 2000).

Entrepreneurs can get this prior knowledge from their personal experience, as a customer, while education, during their previous working experience and other sources, such as prior knowledge of local market or the prior knowledge of other people from their networking.

Talking about education, the difference in hypothesis can be mentioned once again. Ardichvili and Cardozo (2000) point out, that education is not an important factor for the ORP, while Arenius and Clercq (2013) support the idea, that the higher level of education is, the more likely the opportunity will be recognized. Moreover, education provides a wider knowledge base, which can influence on self-confidence. In brief, education as a factor for a migrant’s ORP has to be tested, although the link between education and self-confidence can’t be tested, due to limitations of qualitative method.

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Along with networking, prior knowledge will be tested, as a factor for a migrant’s ORP. It is also important to understand, which exact type (source) of prior knowledge has the most influence on the ORP.

One of the most discussed and tested factor is creativity. Entrepreneurial creativity is an ability to rapidly recognize the associations between problems and their purposed solutions by identification of non-obvious associations and by reforming available resources in a non-obvious way, finding new opportunities. Researchers are divided into two main groups: first, who consider, that creativity as a main trait of any entrepreneur, and second, who find out no correlation between creativity and the ORP.

Ardichvili and Cardozo (2000) also find, that solo entrepreneurs are more creative, than those, who are more well-networked or work in team, that is why, more likely to recognize new opportunities.

On the whole, creativity, as a factor will be tested in current research, however, the link between creativity and work in team or solo entrepreneurship is also limited due to the qualitative method, which is used in current research.

Arenius and Clercq (2013) find a unique and a new factor, which hasn’t been studied before: the working status. They say, that individuals with an active working status (employed) are more likely to recognize opportunities, than individuals with passive status (unemployed).

However, migrant entrepreneurship became popular, due to employment problems. That is why, this factor can be included into the final questionnaire, but not into the final model.

Besides networking and prior knowledge factors, personal traits of character and personal characteristics of migrant entrepreneur may also influence the ORP. Some of them are already discussed in different articles and will be included into the model.

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Age is supposed to have no impact on the ORP (Arenius and Clercq, 2013). While, gender is considered to be a factor, and men are more likely to find an opportunity, than women. Due to methodological limitations, age and gender will be included to describe entrepreneur and to get some additional general information, but will not be tested statistically due to the chosen method.

Optimism, Ambitions, Risk-taking, Self-confidence are also factors for the ORP. Ardichvili, Cardozo and Ray (2003) point out optimism in their list of factors. Ozgen and Baron (2007) analyzed and also found out, that self-confidence has an impact on the ORP. Indeed, confidence helps to “sell”—persons high on his dimension and tend to provide entrepreneur with broader social networks and to be more popular than persons lacking in self-confidence. Self-confidence, risk-taking and ambitions will be tested for the migrant’s ORP.

Next two factors are unique and were met in literature only once. First factor is the place of living, which is connected with perception of opportunities. Individuals, living in big agglomerates are more likely to perceive opportunities, that this, living in urban or rural areas (Arenius and Clercq, 2013). Since, this factor is connected with the ORP, it will be included into the final questionnaire.

Second factor, was tested by four researchers: Nicolaou, Shane, Cherkas and Spector during their study, trying to prove, that the ORP is a genetic factor. They made first steps in the research to find it out and prove, that, the ORP and a tendency to become an entrepreneur can be a genetic prerequisite and, that same genetic factors which influence opportunity recognition, also influence the probability to become an entrepreneur (Nicolaou, Shane, Cherkas and Spector, 2009). In other words, if entrepreneur was brought up in entrepreneurial family, it would also influence on his probability to become an entrepreneur and his ORP. Since, genetic factor can be tested only in biology, using special personal tests, current research will try to shed some light on this question and to find out, whether there can be correlation between entrepreneurship in family with the migrant’s ORP.

By the way, migrant entrepreneurs differ due to their country of origin. Though, migrants move from one country to another, it can be argued, that their native culture,

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traditions, mentality, and even, the market conditions can differ in comparison with the Dutch. Cultural difference, along with changes of the market, can provide a gap, which will help migrant entrepreneurs recognize the opportunity. Moreover, native culture or native market can influence other factors and create a competitive advantage in the ORP.

While native entrepreneurs usually borrow their starting capital from the bank, migrant entrepreneurs are less likely to receive bank funding than native entrepreneurs, and therefore often borrow capital from family or other people from their networking (Nijkamp, Sahin and Baycan-Levent, 2009).

Summing up, there are some other factors, which influence the ORP, for example, Sigrist (1999) looks at the cognitive processes involved in the opportunity recognition process. De Koning (1999) and Hills (1997) on the social study network context. In addition, some other factors can be recognized during interviews. As the main aim of the current research is to understand, which factors influence the migrant’s ORP and, whether the ORP in general differs the migrant’s ORP, only main and fundamental factors will be added to the final model.

Dutch market situation and conditions

Dutch market can be considered to be one of the most interesting and competitive, due to the availability of legal conditions, taxes and rules, there are no high barriers to enter markets. Of course, markets with monopoly or some other unique markets are not taken into consideration. In addition, the Dutch culture and informal institutions are friendly and supportive. Mainly, all Dutch people speak two or even more languages, which provides migrant entrepreneurs with an opportunity to start their own business on the Dutch market, without having language barriers.

According to a study by Kloosterman, van der Leun, and Rath (2002), migrants in the Netherlands have found themselves in a rather marginalized position. In 1986, 11,500 firms in the Netherlands were run by migrant entrepreneurs. This number has doubled in 1992 and tripled to 34,561 in 1997. The lack of financial capital and also appropriate human capital (educational qualifications) led migrant entrepreneurs to set up shops in markets with low barriers of entry in terms of capital outlays and required

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educational qualifications. In the Netherlands about three out of five migrant entrepreneurs have set up shops in wholesale, retailing or restaurants. Kloosterman, van der Leun, and Rath (2002) explain the success of entrepreneurs in general and that of migrants in particular by the concept of ‘mixed embeddedness’, which refers to encompassing the crucial interplay between the social, economic and institutional context. This concept of mixed embeddedness refers to the complex way in which migrant businesses are inserted, on the one hand, in the specific Dutch socio-economic and institutional context and, on the other, immigrant contexts and which involves diverse configurations of financial, human, and social capital. According to this view, the rise of migrant entrepreneurship is, theoretically, primarily located at the intersection of changes in socio-cultural frameworks on the one side and transformation processes in urban economies on the other (Kloosterman, van der Leun, and Rath, 2002). The small outlays of capital and the relatively low educational qualifications constitute a crucial component in this mixed embeddedness. This mixed embeddedness is the main feature of migrant entrepreneurship in the Netherlands.

Of course, migrant entrepreneurs differ from local entrepreneurs, not only from a business perspective and in the ways of serving clients, but also in their approach to the opportunity recognition process and innovations.

Here is an example, which can illustrate the difference of approaches between migrant entrepreneurs and local entrepreneurs. In the Netherlands, this type of very small- scale (mostly take-away) restaurants is declining, partly because of the competition by McDonald’s and other hamburger chains. Dutch entrepreneurs are quitting the snack-bar businesses, but immigrants (especially Turks and Egyptians) are on the increase (Kloostermaan, 2010).

Once more, this example underlines the difference in the ORPs between migrant entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs in general. Still, migrants have one sufficient advantage: they see the gap between their native country and country, where they migrated. They see the same things in a different way and it helps them to recognize unique ideas and create something new.

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In the article of Kloostermaan (2010) there is an example of migrant, who found an opportunity, which occurred in rather unexpected way. Take Yalc ̧ in Cihangir, a young Kurdish immigrant from Turkey instead of continuing along beaten tracks and become just another bicycle repair man, sensed new opportunities and started making cargo tricycles and cargo bicycles designed to carry children through the crowded streets and small alleys.

A closer look at how his business is organized, confirms the extensive literature on the social embeddedness that shows how immigrants, in many cases lacking in financial capital, are nevertheless capable of starting business by relying on their social capital (Kloostermaan, 2010). Two brothers have (low-paid) jobs in his small factory, his sister-in-law runs the shop and his family from Turkey offered financial help at an early stage when he nearly broke. Cihangir evidently benefits from being embedded in a network of close social relations and family ties. This network, on the one hand, offers the right resources and, on the other, shapes the goals.

Amsterdam, with its particular spatial morphology and its large population of well-to-do urbanites, offers the right kind of local consumer market to sell carrier bikes. In addition, the local regulatory environment allows the starting of such a manufacturing business in the city center (Kloosterman, 2010).

On the whole, the Dutch market is relevant example, which provides migrant entrepreneurs with opportunities to start business. Informal systems provide a friendly environment, which is supportive and accepts all kinds of start-ups, from a shop, to cargo bikes. Thus, migrant entrepreneurs have all needed conditions for the ORP.

Model

For current research, a new model was created. Based on a chapter II – literature analysis, some of the factors were rejected and some of them were supposed to have influence on the migrant’s ORP. In many articles there were found no models, which fit the topic of current research. The model consists factors which influence the ORP for Migrant entrepreneurs on the Dutch Market.

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Factors Social: • Networking • Culture Personal: • Optimism • Self-confidence • Risk-taking • Ambitions Prior Knowledge:

• Type of prior knowledge • Previous experience Other: • Age • Gender • Level of education • Place of living • Country of birth • Reasons for migration

ORP

Dutch markets

Venture creation by migrant entrepreneurs

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CHAPTER III – Methodology

To find the answer on the central question of current research paper, case study with a qualitative method of semi-structured interviews fits better, than others. First of all, sample group is not broad enough to get a free access to use the quantitative methods. Qualitative research builds on the flexibility of the researcher and gives room to analyze the data in the way he wants to.

The central questioning of this inquiry is based on an inductive, bottom-up approach towards answering questions of how and why. Under such premises, it is an accepted practice to use exploratory research (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). Case-study based approach to data gathering is a widely accepted and useful practice to answering questions of how and why (Yin, 2008).

Case-study is an empirical method of systematic, in-depth data collection through detailed examination of a particular setting, event, organization, person etc. aimed at understanding that particular phenomenon, or subject, or function (Berg, 2009). Case study research can be qualitative, quantitative or a combination of both (Yin, 2008). Berg (2009) suggests that a case study can be of three general types, serving various research needs: intrinsic, instrumental and collective case studies. Intrinsic case studies are used for illustrating a peculiarity, or when a research is concerned with a very particular case. Instrumental case studies are used to offer an extra insight into a phenomenon or to make a theoretical development more generalizable. Collective case studies use several sub-cases all aimed at providing insight into a certain broader context and within such definitions we propose the collective case-study method, also referred to as multiple-case study method (Yin, 2003).

As it is known, case studies can be: qualitative, quantitative, mixed and etc. For current research a qualitative method is chosen. Also, to collect the data for a case study, many instruments are available, such as: interviews, document analysis, survey, or their combination. Interviews are chosen as the main method for collecting data. So, the case study with a qualitative interview method is used for the current research.

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With only 10 case studies on various migrant the theory available does not cover vital intricacies of the field, therefore existing literature will be used as support; however, further theoretical assumptions are to be drawn.

This chapter consist of 6 main topics: Sample, Case selection, Research instruments, Data collection, Interview procedure and Data analysis. All this steps are described in this chapter. In addition, there will be a step: results and discussion, which are presented in subsequent section.

Sample

The sample consists of entrepreneurs, who started their own business. Migrant entrepreneurs, which had or have their own business on the Dutch market. The size for my survey should be at least 10 migrant entrepreneurs. Migrant entrepreneur – is an entrepreneur, who wasn’t born in Holland, but moved to the Netherlands and started his own business or a start-up. The motivation for coming to the Netherlands is not really important.

There is no difference between, which market is chosen for their business, what is their age or gender. The only criteria is a venture, created on the Dutch market.

To get access to the entrepreneurs, personal networking, Facebook and special migrant communities in Amsterdam, were used. After first interviews, the networking of interview participants were also used for help.

Case selection

Cases were selected using the “theoretical replication logic” to produce contrasting results (Yin, 2003). Based on this principle, the balance between consistency and variation should be found. That is why, cases are chosen to have certain migrant entrepreneurship features, but also included sufficient contextual and structural diversity. In other words, to get as much sufficient data as possible, All cases are selected, keeping in mind, that only migrant entrepreneurs are needed, which provides the data with in common features, but still, tries to cover all ages, genders, nationalities and different markets, level of education and etc.

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Research instruments and procedures

The main research aim of the study will be: refining the theory in order to explore some new information, to fill the gap in the existing theories and to understand behavior and advantages or disadvantages of migrant entrepreneurs.

The main method for collecting data will be qualitative method, such as semi-structured interview.

Data collection

As suggested by Yin (2003) case data should ideally be collected from multiple sources. Following interview confirmations of each participant, secondary data on the situation on current markets was collected from open online sources. Secondary data was then analyzed to gain understanding of the market. Secondary data further aided in tailoring the interview protocol to each specific case, and providing a background for subsequent analysis.

Ten semi-structured interviews were conducted balancing maximum allowed variation sampling and sapling adequacy (data saturation). Interviews were conducted by one researcher and either one or two participant interviewees at one time. Immediately following an interview the researcher recorded certain notes or thoughts on the subject which were later incorporated as hyperlinks to interview transcripts.

Interview procedure

All interviews were collected, using the following steps: 1. Test Interview (3 interviews were used to test the questions) 2. Selection of cases (initial secondary data collection).

3. Preliminary contact with possible interview subjects + Interview confirmation. 4. Primary data collection (semi-structured interviews).

5. Organizing data into notes and transcripts.

After all the interviews took place and the needed data was collected, it was analyzed.

Data analysis

Data analysis in qualitative research means that one have to read, encode and interpret all information. For data analysis, the key data analysis processes will be used: coding.

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Coding is an interpretive technique that organizes the data. In coding, interview data is broken into interpretable segments and compared. Each segment was labeled with a code, which were needed to structure all the information and make a further analysis and make conclusions.

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CHAPTER IV – Results

The study examines factors, which influence opportunity recognition process of migrant entrepreneurs on the Dutch market. For further exploration of this phenomenon, supporting questions mentioned earlier as an addition to the central question, shall be elaborated upon. To aid this endeavor, 10 in-depth interviews were conducted, analyzed, and discussed in detail.

Participant’s overview

Overall 10 migrant entrepreneurs participated in this research and since some of the participants wished to remain anonymous, names and company details will not be detailed.

All entrepreneurs in this study came to the Netherlands from different countries, mainly from Easter-Europe and such countries as Ukraine, Romania, Lithuania, Russia and Africa, especially Ghana. All have or had their business on the Dutch market. Three out of ten entrepreneurs were woman, and the rest were man. The study participants come from a variety of age ranges, with five participants under the age of 25, three entrepreneurs are between 25-35 years, and two entrepreneurs were over 35 years old. The industries of their start-ups range from Health care, to Seafood through Entertainment and other. Two out of ten cases are unsuccessful, whether 8 are still active. All the cases are mainly small and rarely medium size. All of the cases are profit-organizations.

Of the ten participants seven came to the Netherlands to study, one to start their own business, one to visit family and friends, and one came because of their marriage to a native Dutch.

Nine out of ten interviews were recorded during face-to-face sessions, while only one interview was taken by Skype.

All entrepreneurs provided all the needed information, to analyze which factors influence the opportunity recognition process for migrant entrepreneurs on the Dutch market and asked to share the results of the thesis with them.

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To sum-up the participant’s overview part, a summary table 1 is presented below:

№ Age Gender Education Country of birth

Industry Age of the venture

Segment 1 35 F Bachelor Portugal Haircut

saloon

2 months B2C

2 23 M Masters Russia Printing

shop, web-site About 4 months (doesn't exist now) B2C

3 25 M Bachelor Ghana Health

care, web-site

6 months B2B

4 23 M Bachelor Romania Bike

repair

1 year B2C

5 24 M Masters Russia Sea-food 6 months B2B

6 33 M Bachelor Ghana Music,

Managem ent, Entertain

ment

2 years B2B

7 41 F HBO Ukraine Music,

Managem ent, Entertain

ment

8 years B2B

8 24 M Masters Russia Art,

entertainm ent, web-site About 1 month (doesn't exist now) B2C 9 23 M High school Lithuanian Service, electricity, repair 1 year and 6 months B2C

10 25 F Masters Lithuanian Skin care, cosmetics, web-site

6 months B2C

Table 1. Participant’s overview due to age, gender, level of education, country of birth, industry, age of the venture and business segment.

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Summing the table 1 up, five out of ten entrepreneurs are younger than 25 and only two entrepreneurs are elder, than 35. 70% of entrepreneurs are male, and 30% are female. Six out of ten cases work in B2C – segment and only four out of ten entrepreneurs have started their venture more, than one year ago, mainly, they all have start-ups. Finally, all entrepreneurs are mainly from European (mainly, Western European) countries, from Russia and from African countries (Ghana).

Data analysis

The data was collected qualitatively through a self-structured interview, provided with all needed information, to get the answer for additional questions, which support the central question.

During the interviews, all the factors were tested and the results will be depicted during the next sub-chapters. Still, the results part will be started from two fundamental factors for OPR, such as networking and prior knowledge.

Also, while interviews, some additional factors were tested and some new were found during the process of collecting the data.

Networking

Networking is considered to be one of the most important factors not only for the opportunity recognition process, but also for opportunity development process, starting the business, legal processes, etc. “I just came here, meet one holland guy, fixed him the laptop, changed the screen and he said: you can just open your own firm here, just take a KVK number, register your BSN number and let's do it”.

In reference to networking as a factor for an opportunity recognition process, it’s needed to mention one more time, that there are two main types of networking: strong ties (close friends, family, etc.) and weak ties (random people, mates, group members and etc.) Both, strong ties and weak ties were tested during the case studies.

First of all, in just two out of ten case studies, networking had no impact on the opportunity recognition process, while five out of ten participants found ideas due to networking. As for the last three cases, the opportunity recognition process was linked

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both with prior knowledge and the help of networking. All this cases will be shown below in Matrix 1.

Weak ties were supposed to provide entrepreneurs with an opportunity to recognize more opportunities for business, than people, who have less weak ties. This hypothesis was tested during the case studies and it was found out, that people, with more weak ties, who try to communicate with a lot of people, see more opportunities for business, than entrepreneurs who lack weak ties. “Communicating with people, which know, what are they doing. Communicating with a friend of mine, who is purely a friend, and he has degree in medicine, and we just came out to party a lot for festivals in Amsterdam and we were talking also a lit bit about business and he told me about the problems in the health industry”

Thus, 4 out of 5 entrepreneurs, who already have their start-ups are looking for new opportunities. Some of the entrepreneurs are developing new ideas, which were found after the current idea and mainly, through the communication with people from weak ties.

While weak ties are needed mainly for the quantity of the ideas, strong ties, are supposed to help with the quality of the idea.

Two ideas, found through weak ties were unsuccessful, while other ideas, which were discussed with people from strong ties, such as: family, close friends, and significant others are successful and growing from day to day.

In other words, after founding an opportunity through networking, five out of ten entrepreneurs discussed their idea with part of the networking with strong ties and received the necessary feedback. “I talked with many clients. With people, who had their own business, to understand about if the location and the idea is good.” Even those entrepreneurs, who found their idea without any help of their networking, tried to get a feedback, which can help them to improve the idea. “[Did you discuss your idea with someone?] Yes, with a lot of people: my friend, family, boyfriend, business network. But honestly, I asked them to give an advice, or to stay silent. I didn't want them criticize my idea. But I don't believe, that some person can know the future.”

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Strong ties helped entrepreneurs to develop the idea of the business and to start it faster, than they could do it by themselves.

In reference that, networking helped some entrepreneurs with legal regulations, such as firm registration, opening of a bank account, and etc., some of them used local friends to understand the market and the customer’s problems better and not to make mistakes. “I also consulted with my father and his partners in Amsterdam about, what do better, because they have experience.” But also, local networking helped with some insights which were recognized by migrant entrepreneurs and, without knowing this local insights, entrepreneurs couldn’t even know about this opportunity.

Making a very first conclusion about networking, migrant entrepreneurs use the help of the networking not only to recognize the opportunity, but also to develop it and answer some specific questions. Also, some ideas were found through the communication with local people, who know the market, customers and problems, which provided migrant entrepreneurs with the information needed to see the gap between two markets and two cultures, which created a fundament for the opportunity recognition process.

Prior Knowledge

Prior knowledge, along with networking is also considered to be a fundamental part of this processes. There are different types of prior knowledge, from which the idea can come and the entrepreneur can realize it.

After ten case-studies, it was found out, that five out of ten ideas came from the prior knowledge of the customer, two out of ten were ideas from the prior knowledge of people from the networking and three out of ten ideas were developed with the help of prior knowledge, but non of the ideas were realized without any prior knowledge.

All the ideas are mainly based on the prior knowledge from three or more fields, being a combination of prior knowledge from different spheres. Mainly, eight out of ten ideas, have a background from three different fields of their or friend’s prior knowledge. One out of ten ideas are based on only two fields of prior knowledge and only one idea is based on the prior knowledge from the only field.

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Talking about ten cases, it was found out, that there are five main fields of the prior knowledge for migrant entrepreneurs on the Dutch market. Main fields of prior knowledge are: Education, Working experience, Customer and Personal experience and, knowledge of the Market, which consist of two main parts: knowledge of local market and native market.

From the table 2, it’s clear, which type (source) of prior knowledge helped entrepreneurs, to find the idea and recognize an opportunity for their start-up.

Case study Source of prior _{Knowledge 1} Source of prior _{Knowledge 2} Source of prior _{Knowledge 3}

1 Work experience Education Native market

2 knowledge of the Friend's prior

local market Work experience

Friend's customer experience

3 Friend's working _experience Education Customer's _experience

4 Customer's _experience - -

5 Work experience Native market Personal experience

6 Work experience Education Personal experience

7 Personal experience Local market Work experience

8 Personal experience Work experience Education

9 knowledge of local Friend's prior

market Work experience -

10 Native market Customer's experience Education Table 2. Source of prior knowledge in the opportunity recognition process.

One of the most important things: migrant entrepreneurs, who had less than three sources of prior knowledge, started their business, because, they were out of need. They had no other ways of staying in Holland, due to employment regulations or the situation in their native country, which is linked.

As for the main types of prior knowledge, it is needed to sum-up, that, in 8 out of 10 cases, working experience helped in the OPR, while 7 out of 8 entrepreneurs used their own working experience, and only 2 out of 10 cases found their idea without their prior knowledge from working experience. That is why, working experience is one of the most important factors for an ORP of migrant entrepreneurs on the Dutch market.

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Personal experience and customer experience together can be considered to be the second main type of prior knowledge, as 7 out of 10 entrepreneurs, used the knowledge gained, from their customer or personal experience as a foundation for the ORP.

Top-3 of the main types, which influence on the ORP among migrant entrepreneurs is closed by the prior knowledge of the market. Six entrepreneurs found their idea, having their own knowledge of native (3 out of 6) market or local (2 out of 6) market, while, only 1 case is connected with the friend’s prior knowledge of the local market, which helped in the ORP.

The last type of prior knowledge, which had any influence on ORP of migrant entrepreneurs is education. Half of all the cases are based on the knowledge, received from some form of higher education. It is an interesting factor, and will be analyzed in greater detail in the next sub-chapter.

So to conclude this section, prior knowledge as a factor plays a basic role in this process for migrant entrepreneurs. All cases are based on at least one type of prior knowledge, while, mainly, ideas come from the combination of 3 different types of prior knowledge. Working experience is the main important type of the prior knowledge, while, education can be considered as the least important type of prior knowledge.

Networking and Prior knowledge

After the analysis of these two fundamental factors (networking and prior knowledge), which provide entrepreneurs with the information needed for an ORP, it’s needed to find the most important factor, which plays the crucial role in the ORP for migrant entrepreneurs.

Matrix 1 shows the distribution of all cases, between presence of networking and prior knowledge in opportunity recognition process.

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Matrix 1. Distribution of cases between Prior Knowledge and Networking, as a fundamental factor of Migrant’s ORP.

From the matrix 1, it is clear, that there are no cases, where ORP isn’t based on networking or on prior knowledge. Two entrepreneurs (marked with blue color) found their idea, from their own prior knowledge and without any help from networking. Two entrepreneurs (marked green) found their opportunity with the help of their networking, which is founded on the prior knowledge of the friends. This is why the presence level of prior knowledge is extremely low, while level of networking is high. The other 6 cases, found an idea with the help of both networking and prior knowledge factors. In half of cases, the dominant factor was the prior knowledge and on the other half, networking had more influence on the ORP, than the prior knowledge.

That is why, it can be conducted, that, mainly, prior knowledge has stronger effect on the migrant’s ORP, than networking. Sometimes, the ORP is fully based on the prior knowledge of the migrant entrepreneur, without any use of networking. There are no cases, where the ORP is based only on networking, that’s why, networking and prior knowledge are two fundamental factors, where prior knowledge is more important.

Prior Knowledge Networking Yes Yes No No

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Personal characteristics

Personal traits of character and characteristics were always tested. It’s considered, that each entrepreneur has to have concrete and specific traits of character, which make person a better candidate for entrepreneurship.

As for the current research, there were chosen 5 main personal traits and characteristics, which were tested: creativity, self-confidence, ambitions, risk-taking and optimism.

All entrepreneurs had to choose the trait, which influenced them primarily while the ORP, and which trait had the least influence on ORP. Other traits of character were considered best or worse, but somewhere in the middle.

Table 3 shows the distribution of traits and characteristics for all entrepreneurs. All characteristics were divided into three main groups: which are effective and helped migrant’s to find the opportunity; which have no influence and neutral. Thus, all the factors are marked with “yes”, “no” or “neutral” in the table 3, due to the answers of the entrepreneurs.

Case Ambitions Risk-taking Self-confidence Creativity Optimism

1 Neutral No Yes Yes Neutral

2 Neutral No No Yes Yes

3 Neutral Yes Yes No Yes

4 Neutral Neutral Yes No Yes

5 Neutral Neutral No Yes Yes

6 Yes No Yes Neutral Neutral

7 No Yes Yes Neutral Neutral

8 Neutral No No Yes Yes

9 Neutral No Neutral Neutral Yes

10 Neutral No Yes Neutral Yes

Table 3. Traits of character and their influence on the migrant’s ORP.

All traits of character are analyzed below in the following sub-chapters.

Creativity

Creativity is considered to be one of the most doubtful traits of character. 4 out of 10 entrepreneurs, said, that, mainly creativity influenced on the ORP, while 2 entrepreneurs, called creativity as the least effective personal trait, which has no

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influence on ORP and other 4 entrepreneurs said, that creativity is somewhere in the middle. To illustrate this trait of character, the definitions, provided by entrepreneurs are used:

Positive influence of creativity: “Creativity was probably an important factor. We were forced to come up with the idea, we had no experience or a background, from which we could create smth. The idea came purely, from assuming, what the worlds wants as a product, so the creativity process was important.”

Creativity is the least important factor: “I wouldn't call creativity as a most important feature. You can have an idea, which can be not creative, but it will work brilliant.”

In practice, the same as in theory, creativity can’t be explicitly called an important factor for the migrant’s ORP. But, on the other hand, it can’t be called an unimportant factor. Whether qualitative method with only 10 case studies turned out to be insufficient to test this factor, creativity should be tested once more in future research.

Ambitions

As it is seen from the table 2, ambition is considered to be neutral. The majority of entrepreneur (8 out of 10) said, that ambition is somewhere in the middle. Only 1 entrepreneur figured ambition as an important factor for ORP, and 1 entrepreneur said, that ambition has no influence on ORP.

“The least would be: ambition, because it's not about being the best, it's about being good.”

In general, ambitions of entrepreneurs don’t really play any role in opportunity recognition process and it can be said, that ambition is not a factor for the migrant’s ORP.

Self-confidence

Self-confidence is considered to be one of the important personal characteristics for migrant’s ORP. Seven migrant entrepreneurs mentioned, that self-confidence had the best impact, while they were looking for an opportunity.

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Only one entrepreneur, said nothing about self-confidence, which is considered to be neutral and 3 other entrepreneurs mentioned out, that self-confidence has no influence on ORP.

“Self-confidence: you have to be self-confident in this music, because you will be presenting your business to people. And if you don’t sound confident about yourself, you don't know, what you are doing.” Entrepreneurs consider, that confidence isn’t important: “…when you start this thing you are totally not confident that it’s going to work. The statistics say you have 20% chance to have business in 5 years, so you cant be fully confident knowing these facts.”

As it is seen from table 4, where cases number 2,5 and 8 are shown, some common things and links can be found.

Case Level of education Country of birth Successful _{or not} _confidence

Self-2 Masters Russia Not -

5 Masters Russia Yes -

8 Masters Russia Not -

10 Masters Lithuania Yes +

Table 4. Link between self-confidence as a negative factor for ORP and Level of education, Country of birth and successfulness of the start-up

From the table 4 it’s clear that all entrepreneurs who pointed self-confidence as the least important factor were born in Russia, have the same level of education and 2 out of 3 of the start-ups were unsuccessful.

Also, the table 4 consists of all entrepreneurs from Russia, all entrepreneurs with the Masters level of education. It is evident, that not all migrant entrepreneurs with Master’s level of education point self-confidence as the least important factor for ORP, thus, it can be concluded, that only migrants from Russia consider self-confidence as a not important factor and, it can be a cultural feature, which will be discussed further.

Still, the correlation of factors has to be tested statistically in future researchers. As, qualitative analysis can’t provide a strong evidence, table 4 creates a hypothesis, which can be tested later, through the quantitative analysis.

Migrant entrepreneurs on Dutch markets : Focusing on opportunity recognition process.

Master’s Thesis