Individual Commitment to Entrepreneurial Opportunities within Firms: Does Intuition – Based Behavior Matter?

Abstract

The aim of this qualitative study is to identify how the perceptions of the entrepreneur on the

nature of the opportunity (objective reality / social construction) and his/her cognitive style

(analytical / intuitive) influence the process of commitment to opportunity (analytic process /

intuition-based process). Our findings indicate that entrepreneurs with previous opportunity

exploitation experience perceive systematically opportunities as social constructions. The

individual commitment process to entrepreneurial opportunities perceived as objective

realities is analytical, while this process to opportunities perceived as social constructions can

be intuition-based, analytical, or mixed. Size and industry seem to have a strong influence on

the choice of process type.