{"title":"Is too small always bad? the role of place attachment in harnessing location advantages","authors":"Amato Stefano, Shahab Zare, Lattanzi Nicola","doi":"10.1007/s11365-023-00907-9","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Despite the economic significance of micro-enterprises, the empirical evidence on the contextual factors unlocking their growth potential is somewhat scant. This study pitches into this stream of research by linking micro-enterprises, agglomeration economies, and place attachment literature. Specifically, this research explores whether micro-enterprises benefit the most from the location in agglomerations and from having a local manager in charge of the business capturing the connections to the immediate surroundings. By drawing on secondary data from Italian manufacturing companies, our findings show that micro-enterprises are less productive than the larger ones and that having a local manager further exacerbates the productivity gap. However, the influence of place attachment on productivity reverts to positive when micro-enterprises dwell in agglomerated areas, where they are better positioned to capitalize on localization economies. Our study unveils the ambivalent effect of place attachment on productivity, allowing micro-enterprises mainly to achieve higher productivity gains from agglomerations. Theoretical contributions to contextualizing entrepreneurship research and micro-enterprises growth as well as policy and managerial implications are discussed.","PeriodicalId":48058,"journal":{"name":"International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":6.2000,"publicationDate":"2023-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11365-023-00907-9","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"BUSINESS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Abstract Despite the economic significance of micro-enterprises, the empirical evidence on the contextual factors unlocking their growth potential is somewhat scant. This study pitches into this stream of research by linking micro-enterprises, agglomeration economies, and place attachment literature. Specifically, this research explores whether micro-enterprises benefit the most from the location in agglomerations and from having a local manager in charge of the business capturing the connections to the immediate surroundings. By drawing on secondary data from Italian manufacturing companies, our findings show that micro-enterprises are less productive than the larger ones and that having a local manager further exacerbates the productivity gap. However, the influence of place attachment on productivity reverts to positive when micro-enterprises dwell in agglomerated areas, where they are better positioned to capitalize on localization economies. Our study unveils the ambivalent effect of place attachment on productivity, allowing micro-enterprises mainly to achieve higher productivity gains from agglomerations. Theoretical contributions to contextualizing entrepreneurship research and micro-enterprises growth as well as policy and managerial implications are discussed.
期刊介绍:
The International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal (IEMJ) publishes high quality manuscripts dealing with entrepreneurship, broadly defined, and the management of entrepreneurial organizations. The journal will expand the study of entrepreneurship and management by publishing innovative articles based on different perspectives using a variety of methodological approaches and showing the practical implications of the research for its readership. IEMJ is unique; providing a multi-disciplinary forum for researchers, scholars, consultants, entrepreneurs, businessmen, managers and practitioners in the field of entrepreneurship. The journal covers the relationship between management and entrepreneurship including both conceptual and empirical papers, leading to an improvement in the understanding of international entrepreneurial perspectives of the organisations concerned. Entrepreneurial studies are important in creating new economic activity that in turn increases innovation, employment, economic wealth and growth. The journal focuses on the diverse and complex characteristics of entrepreneurship in SMEs and large companies in local, regional, national or international markets that lead to competitiveness in the face of the effects of globalization. Though preference will be given to manuscripts that are international in scope, papers focused on domestic contexts and issues are welcome also, in order to facilitate the sharing of knowledge and potential generalizability of findings worldwide. IEMJ will publish original papers which contribute to the advancement of the field of entrepreneurship and the interface between management and entrepreneurship, as well as articles on business corporate strategy and government economic policy. On occasions, the journal will also feature case studies of successful firms or other cases having important practical implications. The journal places great emphasis on the quality of the papers it publishes. Submission of a paper will imply that it contains original unpublished work and is not being submitted for publication elsewhere. Officially cited as: Int Entrep Manag J