Entrepreneurial Learning in Online Communities

Abstract

How entrepreneurs learn is key for their success, and a growing body of research has investigated this issue. However, research on entrepreneurial learning primarily focuses on how individuals transform experience, paying less attention to social ways of learning. With the rise of online communities, entrepreneurs increasingly utilize digital spaces to share experiences and seek new knowledge. This could change how entrepreneurs learn. Building on the theory of coactive vicarious learning, we, therefore, investigate how online communities provide avenues for entrepreneurial learning by studying a large online community of entrepreneurs on Reddit. Here, we analyze the top-voted 100 threads from 2018-2019, encompassing 10’277 comments in total. Our findings outline five distinct learning discourses and show how entrepreneurial learning differs due to variations in micro-learning contexts. Doing so, our article (1) contributes to the growing research interest in how entrepreneurs learn in communities, while also (2) adding to the current debate on knowledge sharing and creation in online communities. Furthermore, we (3) provide empirical backing and nuance to the theory of coactive vicarious learning.