Abstract
How does the behavior of the entrepreneur affect the development and performance of the business venture? Why do some small business owner-managers remain small, when others wish to grow? In this dissertation the author tries to answer these questions by examining the importance of stable psychological characteristics of the entrepreneur on business performance and expected future performance. The author argues that the entrepreneurship research focus on the entrepreneurial personality is far too narrow, ignoring a crucial range of psychological factors such as intellectual ability and motivation that matter immensely in terms of how entrepreneurs act. Drawing on modern psychological and entrepreneurship research, the author shows how emotions, attitudes, values, IQ, and attribution affect the entrepreneurs’ behavior and subsequently the performance of the business. The author’s own research is presented and commented upon in six different research papers and in a comprehensive introduction chapter.