Abstract
![][1] ILLUSTRATION: DAVIDE BONAZZI Most efforts to promote technology entrepreneurship, such as courses and incubators, focus on potential founders of startup companies. Yet the vast majority of scientists and engineers contribute to entrepreneurship as “joiners”—employees who join founders in their efforts to start companies. We investigated individuals' entrepreneurial interests through a survey of nearly 4200 science and engineering Ph.D. candidates at tier 1 U.S. research universities ([ 1 ][2]), focusing on three questions: How prevalent are interests in joining a startup as an employee versus being a founder? How are joiners different from founders? How do contextual factors shape different entrepreneurial interests? Among the Ph.D.'s surveyed, 46% were interested in joining a startup as an employee, whereas 11% expected to one day start their own company. Compared with Ph.D.'s interested in careers in established firms, founders and joiners share similar preferences for an entrepreneurial work setting, such as a desire for greater autonomy, tolerance for risk, and a desire to commercialize technologies. However, founders are significantly more risk tolerant and have a stronger interest in management, whereas joiners are more interested in functional work activities such as research and development (RD blanket efforts, such as mandated entrepreneurship training, are likely to be inefficient. Programs should also prepare scientists and engineers for a variety of entrepreneurial roles—joiners as well as founders. 1. [↵][3]1. M. Roach, 2. H. Sauermann , Manage. Sci., 10.1287/mnsc.2014.2100 (2015). doi:10.1287/mnsc.2014.2100 [OpenUrl][4][CrossRef][5] [1]: /embed/graphic-1.gif [2]: #ref-1 [3]: #xref-ref-1-1 View reference 1 in text [4]: {openurl}?query=rft.jtitle%253DManage.%2BSci.%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Adoi%252F10.1287%252Fmnsc.2014.2100%26rft.genre%253Darticle%26rft_val_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Ajournal%26ctx_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ctx_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Actx [5]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=10.1287/mnsc.2014.2100&link_type=DOI
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