Returnee And Non-Returnee Entrepreneur’s Capitals Impact On Entrepreneurial Firm Performance

In this work examines the impact that entrepreneurs who leave their home country for an extended period before returning and starting an enterprise have on their enterprise’s performance versus those entrepreneurs than never leave and start their enterprises. The research looks at entrepreneurs in four developing countries. It compares the performance of those enterprises that have been started by individuals who have left their home country, come back home and started and enterprise against those that never left their home country to reside abroad.
While we know that returnee founded enterprises have been demonstrated to outperform in some measures such as propensity to export, or in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) related industries, usually in a single location, less is understood as to why or how they do so. We also know that each of these “capitals” possesses value, however, we know much less about how they interact and if where the acquired capital(s) were acquired matters. This last issue is of interest within the study of global entrepreneurship and the importance of returnee entrepreneurs for economic development. The findings suggest that being a returnee entrepreneur, returnees, does add value to their enterprise’s performance as compared to those enterprises started by entrepreneurs who never left their home country, non-returnees.
In addition, this research shows that within the context of the research parameters, selected individual capitals, in this case human, social and political, may not help explain why these differences in performance occur and leaves open the question if it is rather the aggregation of the capitals within the entrepreneur that helps us understand the value of expatriation of the individual in their enterprise’s performance. The findings have the potential to provide a more nuanced understanding of the impact of returnee entrepreneurs in developing nations and the role that capital accumulation and utilization by the entrepreneur plays in securing the enterprise’s success.