Schou Peter Kalum, Bucher Eliane, Waldkirch Matthias
Department of Strategy and Management, Norwegian School of Economics, NHH, Helleveien 30, 5045 Bergen, Norway.
Department of Communication and Culture, Nordic Centre for Internet and Society, BI Norwegian Business School, Nydalsveien 37, 0484 Oslo, Norway.
Small Bus Econ (Dordr). 2022;58(4):2087-2108. doi: 10.1007/s11187-021-00502-8. Epub 2021 Jun 1.
New digital technologies possess the potential to transform entrepreneurial processes, such as how entrepreneurs pursue opportunities and access funding and how they learn. How entrepreneurs learn may be transformed as digital technologies provide new spaces for learning, such as online communities. Online communities can gather thousands of participants and provide entrepreneurs with new opportunities for learning that are not limited by time, space, or social class. Yet, we know little about how entrepreneurs take advantage of the new digital opportunities of learning. To remedy this, we studied a large online community of entrepreneurs on Reddit (r/startups), where we qualitatively analyzed the top-voted 100 threads from 2018 to 2019 (10,277 comments in total). By drawing on coactive vicarious learning, a theory that describes how learning is socially constructed through discursive interactions, we outline how entrepreneurial learning is socially constructed through conversations, which are taking place in different micro-learning contexts. Through identifying distinct , we build new theory on entrepreneurial learning in online communities. Our theorizing contributes to (1) the growing research on how entrepreneurial learning is socially constructed in communities, (2) the current debate on knowledge creation in online communities, and (3) the knowledge on how coactive vicarious learning unfolds in communities.
When entrepreneurs go online to learn, new research shows how online communities provide entrepreneurs with diverse learning spaces for developing ideas, learning new skills, and coping with the uncertainties of being an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs increasingly use social media for doing business, but can they also use it to learn about doing business? In this article, we investigate this question by studying an online community of entrepreneurs on Reddit called r/startups, in which entrepreneurs exchange experiences and help each other with questions and issues. We show that entrepreneurial learning is taking place in five forms of learning conversations, which are situated in four learning contexts that differ from each other, from a with a student-teacher dynamic, a space where entrepreneurs collect ideas and develop new skills and knowledge, a context in which they challenge each other, and a context in which they can bring their fears and uncertainties. Our findings show how entrepreneurship practitioners can make use of online communities, encouraging teaching and policy to pay more attention to how entrepreneurs work digitally.
新数字技术有潜力改变创业过程，比如创业者如何追求机会、获取资金以及如何学习。随着数字技术为学习提供新空间，如在线社区，创业者的学习方式可能会发生改变。在线社区可以聚集数千名参与者，并为创业者提供不受时间、空间或社会阶层限制的新学习机会。然而，我们对创业者如何利用新的数字学习机会知之甚少。为了弥补这一不足，我们研究了Reddit上一个大型创业者在线社区（r/startups），对2018年至2019年点赞数最高的100个主题帖（共10277条评论）进行了定性分析。通过借鉴共同行动的替代性学习这一描述学习如何通过话语互动在社会层面构建的理论，我们概述了创业学习如何通过在不同微观学习情境中发生的对话在社会层面构建。通过识别不同的情境，我们构建了关于在线社区创业学习的新理论。我们的理论构建有助于：（1）关于创业学习如何在社区中在社会层面构建的日益增多的研究；（2）当前关于在线社区知识创造的辩论；（3）关于共同行动的替代性学习如何在社区中展开的知识。
当创业者上网学习时，新研究展示了在线社区如何为创业者提供多样化的学习空间，用于发展想法、学习新技能以及应对创业的不确定性。创业者越来越多地利用社交媒体开展业务，但他们能否也利用它来学习如何开展业务呢？在本文中，我们通过研究Reddit上一个名为r/startups的创业者在线社区来调查这个问题，在该社区中创业者交流经验并就问题相互帮助。我们表明创业学习以五种学习对话形式进行，这些对话存在于四种彼此不同的学习情境中，从具有师生动态关系的情境、创业者收集想法并发展新技能和知识的空间情境、他们相互挑战的情境以及他们可以倾诉恐惧和不确定性的情境。我们的研究结果展示了创业从业者如何利用在线社区，促使教学和政策更加关注创业者如何进行数字化工作。
