There is an increasing interest in entrepreneurs’ resilience and well-being from researchers and practitioners alike. This is because entrepreneurs’ resilience and ‘happiness’ relate to their creativity, productivity, and their business’ success (e.g., Stephan, 2018; Wach, Stephan, Weinberger, & Wegge, 2020; Weinberger, Wach, Stephan, & Wegge, 2018). The Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated this interest. For instance, our international project “Supporting Entrepreneurship during the Covid-19 Pandemic: A Global Study of Entrepreneurs’ Resilience and Well-being” documented the profound threat to entrepreneurs’ well-being and their businesses stemming from the Covid-19 pandemic. While entrepreneurs were occasionally thriving, most struggled with increased stress and impaired mental well-being. Many lacked strategies to protect their well-being and some gave up eventually their businesses because of it. Existing research into recovery documents its positive effects but also highlights how difficult it can be to engage in recovery when work is particularly stressful (Sonnentag, 2018). This presentation will show newly initiated research agenda on entrepreneurs’ recovery (Wach et al., 2020, Weinberger et al., 2018; Williamson, Gish, & Stephan, 2021), that is moving from documenting challenges in entrepreneurs’ well-being to implementing and testing recovery strategies to help enhance entrepreneurs’ well-being and their resilience. In this regard, preliminary findings will be given about intervention to equip entrepreneurs with so-called recovery strategies, i.e. strategies that are proven to aid recovery from work stress and thereby allow entrepreneurs to safeguard their well-being.

About the speaker:
Dominika Wach is researcher and lecturer in the department of Work and Organizational Psychology at Technische Universität Dresden, Germany. Her specialties are entrepreneurship and occupational health. Amongst others, she published her research in Journal of Business Venturing, Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Journal of Small Business Management, and International Small Business Journal. Dr. Wach was a head of a Polish partner institution and research team in research projects on success factors of SMEs in Germany, Czech Republic, and Poland funded by German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and she has published on the topic of entrepreneurial performance, well-being, and recovery. Dominika Wach is a member of Academy of Management (AoM), European Council for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (ECSB), and German Psychological Society (DGPs).

NOTE! The webinar is open to ECSB & ISBE members. Your membership status will be checked prior granting access to the webinar. To join ECSB: https://ecsb.org/join-ecsb/. To join ISBE: https://isbe.org.uk/about-us/how-to-join/

How can we make a practical difference with our research and contribute to positive societal change? For entrepreneurship and SME scholars informing and shaping policy and practices is often a key goal. However, as researchers we get trained to do research, but not how to generate and demonstrate impact i.e. the wider economic and societal benefits of our research, which often leaves us ill-prepared to contribute to the growing impact agenda.

In this webinar we explore what impact is and why it is relevant. Drawing on scholars and practictioner from different national contexts, we gain valuable insights into how to achieve practical impact for different policy stakeholders and we draw lessons on how to develop relevant impact pathways for our research and how to evidence the benefit gained by different stakeholders.

Facilitator:
Martina Battisti, Professor of Entrepreneurship, Grenoble Ecole de Management, France

Speakers:
Norin Arshed, Professor of Entrepreneurship, University of Dundee, Scotland
Tanya Jurado, Senior Lecturer of Entrepreneurship, Massey University, New Zealand
Stephen Roper, Professor of Enterprise, Director of the Enterprise Research Centre, Warwick University, UK
Michael Schaper, Adjunct Professor, Curtin University and Council Member, University of Canberra, Australia

NOTE! The webinar is open to ECSB, SEAANZ and ISBE members. Your membership status will be checked before granting access to the event.

To join ECSB: https://ecsb.org/join-ecsb/.