Facing grand challenges: implications for entrepreneur fearful emotional response on venture goal progress

Entrepreneurship is inherently uncertain. When grand challenges come unexpectedly, this uncertainty creates significant challenges for entrepreneurs and their ventures. Taking the global pandemic as an illustrative example, the current study explores the effects of crisis events on entrepreneurs and their responses to addressing grand challenges. Drawing upon the cognitive appraisal theory of emotion, we examine the relationship between perceived crisis event strength and venture goal progress by exploring the mediating role of entrepreneurial fear of failure at a daily-level. Furthermore, we believe that developing digital platform capabilities mitigates the negative effects of such a crisis event. Using a time-lagged experience sampling methodology to capture day-to-day dynamics, we tested our hypotheses with 656 matched observations from 72 entrepreneurs over 10 consecutive working days. Overall, this study offers insights applicable to a wide range of crisis events, highlighting how entrepreneurs navigate challenges, thrive amid uncertainty, and mitigate the harmful impacts on entrepreneurship.