Niloofar abolfathi

Abstract

Despite the proliferation of entrepreneurship training programs, the question remains if such programs can add value to nascent entrepreneurs. To answer it, we compare the efficacy of two broad approaches to entrepreneurship training: a training approach prioritizing demand-side activities (e.g. collecting customer feedback) versus a training approach prioritizing resource-side activities (e.g. mobilizing an entrepreneur’s personal network). We do so by running a field experiment inside a 6-month entrepreneurship program involving 236 entrepreneurs. Inspired by our training, the first group invested more time interacting with potential customers and developing a deep understanding of customer needs and problems. The other group, in contrast, spent more time identifying and exploiting their core resources such as their network. Our final results reveal that the training prioritizing demand-side activities is substantially more effective than the other one in improving the performance of early-stage entrepreneurs.