Gender and success in entrepreneurship research: A critical perspective

This paper aims to challenge the conventional definition of success in entrepreneurship. It pinpoints the inadequacy of its masculine gendered definition to take into account the vision of women entrepreneurs (WEs). It focuses on the concept of success and its various meanings for WEs. The paper is grounded in three qualitative studies on WEs undertaken in Quebec, France and Belgium, reaching 151 diverse entrepreneurs. The findings reveal that the commonly accepted definition and measure of entrepreneurial success, business growth and financial performance, is not adequate for most WE s. Broader visions of success and complex meanings exist among Wes; success is a multi-dimensional reality rather than a simple dominant goal: profits or growth. Our contribution is to challenge the relevance of traditional theoretical frameworks in entrepreneurship, and we plead for their widening, for women and men. We also propose a conceptual grid to reconsider success in entrepreneurship which could be exploited in other research.