The Interplay Among Cultural Leadership Ideals and Entrepreneurs’ Socio-Cognitive Traits

Abstract

The consequences of culturally-endorsed implicit leadership theories have received scarce research attention. The present study aims to make a contribution to fil this research gap. While charismatic leadership is generally viewed positively, self-protective leadership is often viewed negatively. More recently self-protective leadership has been linked to higher levels of entrepreneurial behavior, but its effects remain unclear. This study advances knowledge about the role of cultural leadership ideals blending cultural implicit leadership theories with social cognitive theory. Using a sample of 33 countries that result from matching GEM and GLOBE datasets and employing a multi-level model, this study examines the interaction of country- level culturally-endorsed leadership theories with individual socio- cognitive traits in explaining differences in the levels of opportunity entrepreneurship across countries. The findings suggest that societies that endorse both charismatic and self-protective leadership ideas are more likely to have higher levels of opportunity entrepreneurship. The results show that these two culturally-endorsed leadership ideals increase the level of new venture creation. However, the results also show that the endorsement of self- protective leadership does not increase or decrease the effect of socio-cognitive traits, while the endorsement of charismatic leadership increases the positive effect of self-efficacy on entrepreneurial action and increases the negative impact of the fear of failure. These new insights have relevant implications for both researchers and policy-makers.