Power of Deliberate Practice! A Multi-Wave Field Experiment for Entrepreneurial Behavior Retention

Abstract

Individual entrepreneurial orientation training is a promising psychological intervention based on the Theory of Action Regulation that has contributed to the success of small business owners of developing countries. However, training transfer literature warns about the decay in trained behavior and business outcomes over time. The factors that help in the maintenance of post-training effects are still not extensively researched leaving a huge question mark on acclaimed outcomes. We employed a rigorous combination of an experimental and longitudinal approach for testing the impact of individual entrepreneurial orientation training among 587 small business owners in Pakistan across multiple follow-up waves (T0=before training, T1=at training, T2=1 month after training, T3=6months after training, T4=2years after training). We specifically examined the role of deliberate practice-purposeful, self-regulated, and persistent effort aimed at improvement- in post-training behavior maintenance as well as the subsequent business success. Growth modeling (random coefficient models), mediation, and mediated moderation analyses were done through R. The findings revealed that though individual orientation behavior declines after training, however deliberate practice enhances its maintenance. Moreover, the small business owners who engaged in deliberate practice had higher success rates through the continuous display of individual orientation behavior. The findings implicate that trainees' active approaches help in increasing training effectiveness.