The entrepreneur well-being check: a screener for entrepreneur mental health and well-being

Purpose To develop and validate the Entrepreneur Well-being Check (EWC), a screening tool to assess mental health, well-being and occupational functioning among entrepreneurs. Design/methodology/approach Literature review identified core emotional, well-being and occupational concerns among entrepreneurs. Items for each dimension were drafted, tested for content validity and refined. 314 entrepreneurs completed these items and other instruments to test the EWC scale structure, internal consistency, criterion and construct validity. They retook measures at six months to assess test-retest reliability. Findings Seven items loaded onto one factor. The EWC exhibited good internal consistency, content validity, criterion validity, construct validity and fair test-retest reliability. The EWC score correlated with measures of well-being, occupational functioning and multiple mental health conditions. Research limitations/implications Findings are based on self-report measures in a self-selected sample. The EWC shows validity as a measure of mental health and well-being, but findings await replication. Practical implications The EWC could inform research on the mental health and well-being needs of entrepreneurs and related interventions. EWC-identified distressed entrepreneurs could be offered referrals to care and may benefit from policy or programmatic support. Social implications The EWC is a free, publicly available, evidence-informed screening tool that can identify at-risk entrepreneurs. The EWC could help educators, mentors, coaches and clinicians support entrepreneur well-being. Originality/value The EWC is the first screener of broad mental health, well-being and occupational concerns among entrepreneurs.