Rupashree Baral

This study examines the role of personal and socio-cultural factors on entrepreneurial decisions and performance of women-owned small businesses in India. Using an interpretative approach, we explored the entrepreneurial journey of twenty women entrepreneurs. While the need for flexibility, family orientation, and work-family integration emerged as important personal factors shaping women’s decision to pursue entrepreneurship, family support emerged as a crucial factor for the survival and performance of the business. Gender discrimination and stereotype emerged as societal challenges, and the inadequacy of financial resources and limited institutional support posed as structural challenges. Strong motivation, risk-taking attitude, and persistence are the personal attributes that helped in nurturing the desire to pursue entrepreneurship. Apart from the evidence of Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, strong gender role ideology emerged as a deep-rooted cultural dimension affecting the attitude and behavior of women entrepreneurs. The findings will aid in the development of programs and policies to promote women entrepreneurship.

Purpose: This research aims to study employees' pandemic-induced work–home boundary violations using the work–home boundary model. Boundary theory and social theories provide the theoretical underpinnings for this study. The authors study the role of gender, gender role ideology, and fear of COVID-19 in explaining the relationship between work–home boundary violations, work–family conflict (WFC), and subjective well-being (SWB) among working professionals. Design/methodology/approach: Data were gathered using an online survey on married and working individuals (N = 354) and analyzed using the multi-group analysis technique in structural equation modeling (SEM). Findings: Results show that men faced higher WFC due to job insecurity, while women reported higher WFC due to traditional gender role ideology. Surprisingly, men reported lower subjective well-being due to WFC compared to women, when fear of COVID-19 was low. One promising finding is the potential in using problem-focused coping strategy (PCS) as a boundary-work tactic for both men and women to ensure boundary control (BC) to reduce WFC and improve SWB during the new normal. Practical implications: This study contributes to boundary theory, social role theory, and social support resource theory, along with practical implications for employees, organizations, and policymakers. Originality/value: This study dissects the primary role of problem-focused coping as a valid coping mechanism for managing the issues arising from the pandemic-induced unfavorable working conditions.

Purpose: This paper aims to provide relevant knowledge about entrepreneurship and women’s leadership in the Indian context. More specifically, it unleashes the veiled challenges as well as success stories of select women entrepreneurs of a developing country to bridge the gap between entrepreneurship theory and practice. It aims to provide directions to the policymakers, educationists, society and families in creating a conducive environment that is essential for the success of women entrepreneurs. Design/methodology/approach: With a qualitative case study approach, data were collected from Tamil Nadu, a southern Indian state which has a maximum number of women entrepreneurs. Face-to-face interviews were conducted to explore the supportive as well as challenging dimensions of their entrepreneurial journey. Findings: Content analysis of the interview transcripts indicated that successful entrepreneurs are opportunity-driven and they focus on innovation, service, generation of wealth and employment. Support from family, especially from fathers or husbands, is as important as the entrepreneurial drive, skills and abilities of an entrepreneur. Success for them is being happy, thriving work, having a happy family, having a great work-life balance and the satisfaction to have served society apart from being independent (economically/ financially). Among India’s societal and cultural realities, women have to conquer many hurdles (both implicit and explicit) in their way concerning the societal attitudes toward women stepping out of the home boundaries and traditional gender role expectations. The silver line is societal attitudes are changing, especially in urban India. There are enough support and encouragement from the family, which helps these women pursue their passion and eventually become a successful leader. Social implications: The success stories of women will bring a wave of positive developmental change in India by fostering respect for women in a male-dominated society and flashing the importance of women’s entrepreneurship. Originality/value: This paper provides a new examination of women entrepreneurs that significantly further the debate about the underrepresentation of women in leadership roles, especially in entrepreneurship in an emerging economy context like India. Apart from the deterrents, it aims to highlight the enablers and motivations to choose this unconventional profession.

This study explores how highly educated Indian women entrepreneurs prioritize and manage the work and family role boundaries. It also explores whether boundary management strategies vary based on motherhood and business stages. We explored these issues by interviewing twenty-five financially successful well-educated women entrepreneurs from five cities (Chennai, Bengaluru, Delhi, Hyderabad, and Cochin) in India. We found that the mothers with younger children and entrepreneurs in the early stages of the business preferred to integrate the work and family roles than to set a clear boundary between the roles, using various boundary management tactics to achieve work-life balance (WLB). They attempted to minimize imbalance by creating a resource pool, flexible scheduling, working fewer hours, and preferring workplace proximity. Social support seemed to be essential to reconcile the multiple role demands. According to the business and motherhood stages, significant differences were observed in the type and level of WLB issues women face. The study provides recommendations for successful reconciliation between the work and non-work lives in the Indian context. In this culturally unique context, while access to institutional support for women entrepreneurs is meager, any effort to help them reconcile their work and family demands will be helpful.

Purpose: This paper aims to explore the entrepreneurial journey of select women entrepreneurs from South India to provide qualitative insights into the factors influencing their career choice (to become and continue as an entrepreneur) and to identify the drivers of their growth and well-being. Design/methodology/approach: Semi-structured interviews were conducted to gather data from 35 women entrepreneurs in the micro, small and medium enterprises sectors of Tamil Nadu, India. Data were content analyzed using NVivo 12. Findings: Qualitative content analysis identified three broad themes and several sub-themes to suggest a conceptual framework reflecting the possible relationships among them. Women entrepreneurs’ career choice, the growth of their ventures and their well-being were found to be significantly driven by a blend of personal attributes, strong family support and institutional support. Practical implications: The findings will help the government to provide appropriate institutional support with customized initiatives and incentives to encourage women-owned tiny and small businesses to grow faster. Appropriate personality development programs and skills training will aid their growth. Originality/value: This study contributes to the entrepreneurship literature by providing real-life insights from women entrepreneurs from an emerging economy context, especially from Tamil Nadu, which has the highest number of women entrepreneurs in India.

Purpose: The study aims to understand why women-owned microenterprises (WOMEs) in India experience a lower growth rate, where growth can be represented in increments in the venture’s size or scope. There is no conclusive understanding of the factors that affect the sustained growth of WOMEs in India. Design/methodology/approach: What personal, social and economic factors support or hinder the choice, growth and sustainability of women-owned ventures? What role do institutional factors (government, nongovernment organizations (NGOs), self-help groups and microfinance institutions) play toward the sustainability of WOMEs? The answers to these questions were obtained through a qualitative design by interviewing 30 micro women entrepreneurs from Tamil Nadu, a Southern state of India and one of the largest hubs for WOMEs and their responses were content analyzed using NVivo 12 software. Findings: The findings capture and apply the fundamentals of two key theoretical perspectives, resource-based view (RBV) and self-determination theory (SDT), in identifying the links between the individual, social and economic factors and their combined effect on the sustained growth of women-owned micro businesses. The findings add value in identifying the ingrained cultural norms and traditions and several internal and external factors that support or challenge the growth of WOMEs. This study highlights that the interventions by the government need to be strengthened for the growth and sustainability of WOMEs. Practical implications: The study’s findings provide suggestions to policymakers, banks, funding agencies, financial institutions and NGOs to design applicable policies and schemes toward the sustained growth of WOMEs. Originality/value: This study contributes toward a better understanding of the trends in the context of WOMEs from an Indian context. This topic has received little attention in the academic literature. Second, the study’s conceptual contribution is an application of SDT and RBV to understand and categorize the enablers and deterrents in the path of growth of WOMEs, which is a novel pursuit.