Unexpected Events, Opportunity Images, and Entrepreneurs’ Responses to the Unanticipated

Abstract

Entrepreneurs are often confronted with unexpected events. Yet we know very little about the ways in which unexpected events manifest in entrepreneurial efforts. Entrepreneurship and management theory have traditionally viewed the process of individuals processing novel incoming information through the lens of “normalization”, meaning one systematically analyzes data, looks for commonalities, identifies trends and then takes isomorphic action. We argue that an explanation for how entrepreneurs deal with unexpected events does not fit this pattern and requires a different theoretical lens, one we coin “exceptionalization”. We theoretically elaborate exceptionalization as a process of embracing schema-incongruent information, inductively updating opportunity images, and acting in one of four ways: abandoning, self-deception, routinization, or improvisation. This new theory identifies entrepreneurs’ perceptions and considerations of unexpected events as an influential, yet previously overlooked lever in the genesis and pursuit of entrepreneurial endeavors.