Commentary on Sackett et al. (2025): What Goal Diversity Knows: The Structural Roots of Misalignment in New Venture Teams

A Commentary on Sackett et al. (2025): New Venture Team Diversity as an Emergent Complex System

ABSTRACT A promising founding team is one of the criteria investors actively look for in new ventures. Research has shown that gender and ethnicity of founders have signaling power with potentially negative consequences for their perceived risk profile related to new venture funding. Yet it is unknown how new venture teams with gender and ethnic diversity or intersectionality impact new venture funding, although the diversity in new venture teams increases steadily. To address this research need, we build on signaling theory to guide our empirical study, based on 2,626 ventures with diverse new venture teams (6,131 founders). Our results show that gender diversity and intersectionality, as reflected by the presence of a female Asian new venture team member, are significantly negatively related to the absolute amount of new venture funding, yet not ethnic diversity. These findings suggest that signals sent by diverse new venture teams have differing effects on funding.

Purpose Volitional competencies, specifically self-regulation and self-control, are recognized as critical during the early stages of new venture creation, when New Venture Teams (NVTs) actively engage in business formation. Similarly, behavioral dynamics such as team collaboration and cohesion also play a crucial role in business venture creation. Yet, the specific individual volitional competencies and their relationship to the behavioral dynamics within youth NVTs remain underexplored. The purpose of this paper is to explore these volitional competencies and behavioral dynamics after NVTs cross the entrepreneurial Rubicon. Design/methodology/approach Quantitative data was collected on a sample of 515 South African early-stage youth team members regarding seven self-regulation and five self-control volitional competencies and team collaboration and cohesion as the behavioral dynamics. These youth NVTs have crossed the entrepreneurial Rubicon stage, as they created new businesses and are owners/founders of these businesses. Findings Drawing on the Mindset theory of action phases and the self-regulation theory, this study empirically tested the correlational relationship through structural equation modeling. The findings indicate that the self-regulation volitional competencies, particularly attention focusing, self-motivation, emotion regulation, decision regulation and self-determination, as well as the self-control volitional competencies, planning skill and initiating control, significantly influence team collaboration and cohesion. This study challenges the distinction between collaboration and cohesion and combines them as a single construct. Originality/value This study presents a novel theoretical framework that supports eight volitional competencies and two behavioral dynamics that are particularly necessary for early-stage youth NVTs to create new ventures. The findings could contribute to new theoretical construct development, policy formulation, measuring instruments and training programme design.

Purpose This study aims to examines how knowledge management (KM) within new technology-based firms (NTBFs) affects venture teams’ financial attraction (FA) and performance (P), contributing to NTBFs’ survival in highly competitive environments. The large socio-economic impact of NTBFs contrasts with high mortality rates, prompting interest in factors influencing long-term success. Design/methodology/approach This study employed a PLS-SEM model using data from the Global Accelerator Learning Initiative (GALI) of Emory University (2013–2019) to analyze 103 NTBFs from Australia, Canada, France, Germany and the USA. Findings The results confirm significant relationships between KM, FA and NTBF performance, underscoring social capital as a key aspect of KM. Practical implications NTBF venture teams should prioritize building strong networks while acquiring business debt to enhance KM and attract funding. Policymakers must promote KM, encourage collaboration and facilitate access to business credit lines for these firms. Originality/value The findings extend the understanding of these relationships by focusing on venture teams within NTBFs, demonstrating the signaling role of debt financing in attracting investment. The study highlights the crucial role of social capital in KM while indicating that debt may be a stronger signal of viability in specific contexts.

ABSTRACT In early-stage entrepreneurial teams, trust perceptions about new teammates shape venture compatibility and performance. With AI adoption in entrepreneurial teams, early trust dynamics are underexplored. This study investigates trust formation and recalibration when a new teammate is AI, a human, or a human using AI. In a scenario-based experiment with 205 participants, we measured trustworthiness, affective trust, and cognitive trust before and after observing a new teammate’s work. AI teammates began with lower affective trust but gained significantly after observation, while human-using AI teammates were trusted similarly, or more than non-augmented humans. Cognitive trust declined across all teammates but remained comparatively stable for AI. Findings contribute to entrepreneurship and human-AI teaming research by showing that trust calibration depends on teammate type and competence, and by introducing augmented teammates as a distinct category. Practically, ventures adopting AI may benefit from augmentation, with clear human accountability and disclosure of AI capabilities, fostering higher early-stage trust.

Purpose Drawing on conservation of resources theory, this study theorizes and tests the relationships between lead founder Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy and new venture team survival, as channeled through the mediating role of individual team member burnout. Design/methodology/approach Hypotheses are tested using time-lagged data from 52 new venture teams (N = 52 lead founders and 198 team members). Findings Lead founder narcissism is positively associated with team survival, psychopathy is negatively associated with survival, and each of these relationships is mediated by burnout. No support was found for a relationship between lead founder Machiavellianism and burnout, but post hoc analyses revealed a U-shaped curvilinear relationship with burnout. Originality/value This study extends existing research on the Dark Triad traits by shifting focus from solo entrepreneurs or traditional organizational leaders to new venture teams. By highlighting the complex and context-dependent nature of each of these traits, this research offers novel insights into how leader personality impacts new venture team survival, channeled through burnout, in high-interdependence, resource-constrained environments.

How lead entrepreneurs resilience influence entrepreneurial performance in crisis time: A team-level perspective.

Conflict within new venture teams (NVTs) is a critical factor influencing the success or failure of new ventures. Despite its importance, empirical evidence on the dynamics of conflict interactions and their influence on affective team outcomes and eventual venture exits remains scarce. To address this research gap, we draw on Social Baseline Theory to investigate how physiological arousal and physiological linkage during conflict shape subsequent team satisfaction and exit intentions. Using a longitudinal observational lab study design inspired by marriage research, we examined 78 dyadic NVTs. Physiological arousal and linkage were assessed using non-invasive sensors that tracked inter-beat intervals (IBI) and galvanic skin response (GSR). Team satisfaction and exit intentions were evaluated through follow-up questionnaires administered six months later. Our results reveal that physiological arousal, as measured by IBI variability and levels, significantly decreases team satisfaction and increases exit intentions. IBI linkage exhibits a small, decreasing effect on exit intentions. This study provides a novel perspective on conflict dynamics within NVTs, offering actionable insights for identifying promising teams early in the entrepreneurial lifecycle based on their physiological responses during conflict.

Given the dynamic operating environment of New Venture Teams (NVTs), NVTs’ learning process is critical for team success. We propose that internal and external team learning processes transform the effects of founder(s)’ entrepreneurial leadership into NVTs’ team growth and performance in terms of effectiveness and agility. Using a sample of 78 NVTs in South Korea, the findings largely supported our proposed model. Specifically, internal team learning mediated the effects of the founder(s)’ entrepreneurial leadership on team growth and team effectiveness. On the other hand, external team learning mediated the effect of the founder(s)’ entrepreneurial leadership on team agility.

New venture team persistence: a dynamic model of how resilient teams transform collective adaptive responses under adversity

Weathering the pivot: Stability and turnover in new venture teams

As digital principles are adopted throughout the civil engineering and construction industries, the digital revolution has seen significant variability in the actual practice. In mega-projects, Joint Venture Teams consisting of Tier 1 contractors and multi-disciplinary design houses are working in a BIM environment and using Federated Models of the project, from concept through design to construction. However, in more traditional delivery models, the design and construction teams are at arm’s length, separated by time and space, and frequently with all communication through the client and/or contract administrator. The result is, predictably, a lack of effective data sharing. Communication is through formal reports, drawings, and eventually, requests for information (RFI). The design models (if shared at all) are typically not the full BIM model and shared with only a few in the construction team; typically, the surveyors and GPS enabled plant. The digital revolution has seen a significant increase in the capabilities of data capturing equipment, visualisation tools and software with a number of tools becoming widely available. As a result, there are several paths that can be taken (e.g., choosing one brand over another may result in a long-term commitment to that brand or data configuration). The general result is that companies with deep pockets and a willingness to embrace the new technologies are jumping ahead in adopting digital. However, time will tell if they choose the right path while more cautious companies, happy to continue with their traditional technology and workflows, will fall further behind. Most of the industry is somewhere between these extremes; however, the gap between them is growing. This paper considers the growing gap between traditional and digital paths with respect to data capture in the field as it applies to digital geotechnics in a construction phase support (CPS) role. While traditional workflows have their place in the future, it is important to explore the use of digital workflows to enhance the quantity and quality of the data captured, the ability to share the site observations with colleagues and stakeholders, and to have data interoperable with other software to allow further integration and analysis of the data. This paper also noted that both traditional and digital workflows have limitations which must be acknowledged, and where possible measured, to allow the proper interpretation of the data captured.

In public health entrepreneurship, an entrepreneur uses their commercial expertise to solve a public health issue or start a health-related company. This can take the kind of creating a new product, funding a public health organisation or even investing a portion of a company's income into research and development for health-related projects and activities. In order to improve outcomes, economic development, and society well-being, healthcare entrepreneurship is acknowledged as crucial. Startups in the healthcare industry have faced structural, regulatory, organisational and behavioral challenges in the past but new business owners are looking for ways to improve access, affordability and quality. Despite a sluggish investment market healthcare venture capital managed to raise $19 billion in 2023 to fund new initiatives. Many things including consumer demand, local competition and business concepts go into determining the most lucrative healthcare benefits company. However medicines, medical technology, cosmetic, surgery, specialized clinics, telemedicine and laboratories have all demonstrated substantial profitability as a result of high demand and distinctive products. In order to reduce the learning curve especially when building the evidence base for the service, it is advisable for venture teams to have members with expertise in both healthcare and entrepreneurship. One way to get in touch with entrepreneurial accelerators or university tech transfer and commercialisation offices that one might have worked with before is to ask for their help in assembling the team. When developing new healthcare solutions, entrepreneurs should think about ways to involve patients or end-users. One strategy that may improve the solution's applicability and focus on the patient is to collaborate with appropriate patient advocacy groups. New revenue streams and business models may need to be developed by entrepreneurs in the healthcare industry. Healthcare is a fundamental human right but it cannot be provided indefinitely without adequate funding. Participating in healthcare entrepreneurship groups, accelerators and other community initiatives that encourage and facilitate entrepreneurial healthcare participation is one way to fortify one's "business and calling" mentality. Not only do we provide these useful insights for healthcare entrepreneurs but we also include them for other important players. Partnerships that standardise co-produced ideas may be incentivised by corporations. Entrepreneurs with venture capitalists may come up with new ways to finance projects that are tied to unconventional results. By bringing together experts from different fields, non-profits may bring attention to the need for healthcare entrepreneurs. Politicians should think about how to foster business climates that are competitive while maintaining appropriate pricing and cost structures.

ABSTRACT Entrepreneurs frequently face time pressures to achieve milestones, often resulting in significant effort and exhaustion. Drawing on the job demands-resources (JD-R) theory, we analyzed a two-stage path model using 514 observations from 70 startup entrepreneurs, surveyed twice weekly over four weeks. We examined how venture team identification (VTI) and state positive affect (PA)—entrepreneurship-specific personal resources—serve to buffer or mitigate the negative effects of time pressure on emotional exhaustion. Our study advances the existing literature by developing a theoretical model on personal resources in the entrepreneurship context. We further extend the JD-R theory by disentangling the distinct buffering mechanisms of resources: VTI primarily weakens the relationship between time pressure and venture effort, while PA mainly mitigates the connection between effort and emotional exhaustion. We suggest that fostering VTI and PA can help break the cycle of stress and exhaustion, offering practical insights for sustaining entrepreneurial well-being.

Introduction: Street food is a branch-out of Street vending and the reports authentically confirm that 20% of the street vending business in India is of ‘Street food’. The business model- Street food, though grew on the sidelines, as an unorganized-sector arm of food business, showed that it always had the potential to survive by delighting the foodies, since the business model has had clear objectives. Street Food vendors, as mentioned in the draft National Policy, are persons who offer food/s for sale to the public from their temporarily built up structure or mobile / moving stalls. Speaking about Street-Food and the Vendors, specially, they belong to the marginalized urban poor communities. Despite their status in society, they play a dynamic role in the economy – providing foods, which are tasty, cheaper and available at ease, saving time and travel, to many needy buyers. The contribution to economy on account of sale of street foods is quite sizable, especially in the developing countries. Street food - their sale and consumption –has been meeting the needs of rural migrants, who keep moving to urban centres in search of gainful employment. Since the vendors have low or lack of skills, Street food business, as a family/small team venture, turns out to support the livelihoods of these families. Further, the rapid growth that the informal sector in the economy is experiencing, provides succour to street vendors, with particular reference to Street-foods, pursuing of which would need only ‘low initial investment’ and ‘low skills’, which is not difficult for them to be equipped with. By keeping a few things in mind, such as hygiene and safety, anyone can enjoy authentic Indian street food. Objectives: The paper unfolds all the facts relating to the Street foods, which is by itself a grand chapter in culinary for centuries, and which retained its status all through in the hospitality industry. The paper also uncovers the facts as to how the Street food business model remained as un-organized sector arm - with the findings of case studies supporting the conclusive observations. Observations also were made about the instances of Street food model of business defying certain of the formal aspects of business for making itself enduring and successful, retaining its special characteristics - cultural, social and economic in nature. Methods: The research study undertaken has been done through exploration of the past data - Research papers, Case Studies and also the other secondary sources of authentic nature. The micro-level study done throws open observations of diverse facts, which have been recorded and sequenced to document the history of Street foods - the past, the present and future. Results: The research studies of diverse nature on the subject ‘Street Food” speak about the highly varying operational specifics, however the findings of such careful studies enlighten us on a few points which enable us to understand that the Street-food business model was a naturally born model of food business, surviving right from the ancient past. It is therefore a need based essential and is relevant for all times – the past, present and future. Like home – the living place for people and families, the Street is a God enabled public place which is the common ground for people to go around, meet and acquaint with others, interact and exchange their ideas, opinions, issues and to be supportive in co-existence. The Street has been a showcasing place for people to inform, instruct, influence, entertain, exchange enabling in the earliest days, bartering of commodities, products, services. The practice is still in vogue. Conclusions:The features – Easy availability, low cost and tasty options meeting the needs of those looking for it, make the Street foods to continue to be popular facing all odds that work against it. Street food thus had its origin right from the unknown past and will ever remain in future, if the study findings are to be taken for validation.

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the combined effect of gender, trust, leadership style and team integration on entrepreneurial team performance. Through an integrated analysis of gender composition and team processes, we enhance the understanding of the drivers of new venture teams’ performance. Design/methodology/approach We use data collected from multi-player startup simulations involving 52 teams of masters-level students across two countries. We used the fsQCA methodology to perform a configurational analysis of different team composition and processes. This innovative application of the methodology allows us to identify new combinations of gender diversity and team processes that improve team performance. Findings Teams with higher proportions of women who shared leadership were more profitable in several configurations, demonstrating the importance of the relationship between gender and leadership models on performance. Shared leadership resulted in high levels of trust and sense of control, which increased team effectiveness and performance. We found that combining trust with shared leadership consistently resulted in successful positive outcomes, although not all successful teams included these attributes. Originality/value Our findings contribute to renewing the frame of research on new venture team performance that has long revolved around the leadership-cohesion-alignment (LCA) triangle. Although the LCA paradigm certainly improved our understanding of new venture success, it provided only a partial understanding of the organizational and relational context. It offered a restricted view of the sources of cohesion and alignment. We believe that our approach to data analysis based on the fsQCA method allowed us to extend our understanding of the determinants of entrepreneurial team performance.

The new venture team (NVT) is pivotal in corporate innovation (CI). This study explores the dual paths of risk-taking and internal controls as mechanisms for the faultline effect at the NVT level by integrating upper echelon and faultline theories. Using a dataset of Growth Enterprise Market-listed firms in China, the study findings reveal a significant negative impact of relationship-related faultlines and a significant positive impact of task-related faultlines on CI. Moreover, redundant resources and the regional institutional environment positively moderate these relationships, thus underscoring their crucial roles in fostering innovation. This study provides novel insights into how structural and contextual factors activate faultline effects, emphasizing the dual nature of social categorization and information processing in innovation processes. Furthermore, the results contribute to faultline theory and CI research by offering actionable strategies to optimize NVT structures and enhance enterprise-level innovation outcomes.

The mechanisms of team internal social capital and entrepreneurial learning relationships in new venture teams (NVT) are relatively under-studied. This study investigates the association between internal social capital and entrepreneurial learning and the mediating roles of shared mental models and organisation-based self-esteem. Study 1 collected data from 284 participants from 111 NVTs in Eastern China. The hypotheses were tested using a multilevel structural equation modelling technique. The findings showed that (1) team internal social capital positively influenced entrepreneurial learning, and (2) shared mental models and organisation-based self-esteem both mediated this relationship, unveiling a dual-process mechanism. In Study 2, we conducted semi-structured interviews with a convenience sample of 14 participants from 6 NVTs in Eastern China. The results showed that internal social capital shared mental models, and organisation-based self-esteem influenced entrepreneurial learning in NVTs. This study is one of the first to use qualitative and quantitative analyses to investigate the mechanisms underlying the relationship between team internal social capital and entrepreneurial learning. The results suggest that team internal social capital promotes positive entrepreneurial behaviour, highlighting the importance of team internal social capital and entrepreneurial learning in organisational development. It can also provide indicators for those wanting to support new ventures.

When shared leadership backfires in new venture teams: the roles of power struggles and functional background diversity