Research pick: Closer to the entrepreneurial heart - "At the heart of things: the impact of life-partners on entrepreneurs’ psychological capital"

The out-moded aphorism – “Behind every great man is a good woman” – might be brought clumsily up-to-date by writing instead that “Alongside every great person is a great partner”. Indeed, writing in the International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, researchers from Israel have investigated the impact of a life partner on the social capital of entrepreneurs.

Ben Bulmash of the Faculty of Technology Management at the Holon Institute of Technology in Holon, suggests that psychological capital is a concept of growing importance in the world of entrepreneurial business. In this world challenges and uncertainties are ever-present and perhaps increasingly so in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, civil unrest, climate change, and war-mongering. There are three psychological components to psychological capita, which might be thought of as a state of mind rather than a character trait: optimism, pessimism, and self-esteem. How, asks Bulmash, are these three traits affected by the presence, support or otherwise of a life partner?

In studying entrepreneurial activities and the world of business, the focus is often on product design, marketing strategy, financial planning, and technological aspects of the business. The right blend can lead to success. That said, previous studies have shown that positive psychological capital can lead to business longevity and success. A focus on the entrepreneur’s life may, however, be just as important a factor. Bulmash now has found, as one might expect to some degree, that low levels of support from an entrepreneur’s life partner lead to what might be referred to as the least favourable mental states.

“Difficult and unsupportive relationships are detrimental to business success, possibly more so in the early stages of a business, when uncertainty is high and results not immediate,” Bulmash writes. It is important when trying to understand entrepreneurial activity to understand that the entrepreneur’s life and life partner can play a significant role in predicting the trajectory of their business.

Bulmash, B. (2022) ‘At the heart of things: the impact of life-partners on entrepreneurs’ psychological capital’, Int. J. Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 45, No. 4, pp.476–488.