Effectuation and Over–Trust: Response to Sarasvathy and Dew

Abstract

In their response to our article, Sarasvathy and Dew (S&D) agree with us that effectuation supposes over–trust and yet claim that trust is irrelevant to an effectual entrepreneur. They further claim that our approach to entrepreneurship is trait based. We respond to these comments by pointing out the more subtle ways in which entrepreneurs deal with trust. In addition, while acknowledging the utility (and limitations) of a trait–based approach in advancing entrepreneurship theory, we refute their assertions that our paper is based on this approach. Finally, we address the “alternate” behavioral assumptions that S&D advance. Independent of the merit of these alternate assumptions, they are not contradicted in our article. We believe that these assumptions need to be developed further to contribute to a debate on their merits for advancing theory building in entrepreneurship.