Effect of grit and orientations to happiness on entrepreneurial performance among venture founders

Abstract

To date, research on which factors contribute to entrepreneurial performance falls short of a comprehensive explanation. Grit, although not as thoroughly researched as other personality traits, has been found to be a significant contributor to achievement in many fields, including entrepreneurship. To better understand how it contributes to entrepreneurial performance, a better definition and analysis of grit is needed. This includes a closer look at how we measure entrepreneurial performance. When we allow for a more subjective measurement of performance from the perspective of the entrepreneur, we gain a better understanding of how grit is related to other performance motivations, such as the entrepreneur's happiness orientation. This analysis reveals that differing orientations are more or less associated with grit: Individuals who pursue happiness through pleasure tend to have different levels of grit than those who pursue happiness through meaning and engagement. Thus, further analysis of entrepreneurial measurements of performance leads to better clarification of the role grit plays in the prediction of entrepreneurial performance.