Page 74 - Crossing Cultural Boundaries - Cees den Teuling

values. This may lead to specific responses to tackle barriers on the road to a starting venture. In general, a higher level of entrepreneurial activity is found in the more developed countries with a higher cultural approval on personal and individualistic values, as argued by Hechavarria and Reynolds (2009).
It can be assumed that there are six styles of leadership, used and propagated by owners/entrepreneurs and managers. Those styles are Transformational, Transactional, Passive-avoidant, Innovation, Pro-active, and Risk taking leaderships. Emotional competences, such as self-management, social awareness, relationship management and personal characteristics are instrumental in the adaptation of a certain management style or a mixture of elements from several styles.
Kasouf, Morrish, and Miles (2013; 2015) discuss the relationship between human capital, experience, explanatory style and entrepreneurial self-efficacy. According to the authors, the process of entrepreneurship involves series of choices, among which is also a choice to actually start the business or initiate an activity leading to innovation. Such choice is usually made by a type of people who explore and turn into advantage entrepreneurial opportunities. These individuals positively assess perceived opportunities, accept risk, and ultimately initiate entrepreneurial action while many others choose not to act in a same manner in similar circumstances. Another important element is self-efficacy, the basic content of which is essentially grounded in the confidence that a course of action can be implemented. In other words, the entrepreneurial person is affected by the perception that he/she is able to reach the goals and/or set destinations.
A 2x2 typology of entrepreneurs is developed by Tang, Tang, and Lohrke (2008), according to whom they may be divided into four types based on two dimensions: high versus low entrepreneurial alertness and internal versus external attribution styles. The four types of the entrepreneurs are the true believers, clueless, practical and reluctant. According to the authors, some of the types (practical and reluctant) differ across three key entrepreneurial characteristics, which are feed for achievement, risk taking pro-activity and commitments. The entrepreneur with a higher entrepreneurial alertness is characterized as an “opportunity identifier” and with an improved capacity for “lateral thinking”. The availability of strong internal and external attribution styles provides a strong foundation for a successful implementation of the transferred managerial knowledge.
As argued by Green, Covin, and Slevin (2008, p. 357) “Strategic Reactiveness and Entrepreneurial Orientation are identified as being very useful and even absolute
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