The gap between entrepreneurial behaviour and entrepreneurial identity: A case for ethnographic and autoethnographic methods

Abstract

I argue that increased use of ethnographic methods and autoethnographic methods can help bridge the gap between entrepreneurial identity (EI) and entrepreneurial behaviour (EB) in entrepreneurship research and give theoretical weight to the concepts. The disconnection between EI and EB is caused by the inability to answer questions about how EI impacts EB. Using ethnographic methods allows for a fuller depiction of the social context in which entrepreneurs operate, demonstrating the relationship between EI and EB. However, EB remains practically defined and theory about EI is borrowed from other various other literatures, such as sociology, importing the problems as well as the benefits. I argue that the use of autoethnographic methods, researching EI–EB from the entrepreneur's perspective, produces data that can be used to build theory that maintains the practical tilt of entrepreneurship research and addresses its theoretical shallowness.