Mapping entrepreneurial competencies: integrating scholarly and practitioner perspectives

Purpose This study aims to synthesize competency-related terms used in the literature and by entrepreneurs into a consolidated framework of entrepreneurial competencies. Design/methodology/approach A structured focused review identified entrepreneurial competencies reported in prior research. Audio podcast analysis and semistructured interviews documented founders’ perspectives. Drawing on competency-related terms identified through these three studies, expert judges consolidated these terms into themes that distinguish unique entrepreneurial competencies. Next, experts categorized them as innovation/venture creation, venture growth or founder success competencies. Findings This thematic analysis integrated and synthesized 384 competency-related terms mentioned by scholars and practitioners into 56 distinct competencies. These include 15 innovation/venture creation, 20 venture growth and 21 founder success competencies. Originality/value A main contribution is the synthesis of the disparate, fragmented terminology used by researchers and entrepreneurs to describe entrepreneurial competencies. This study also demonstrates how podcast analysis may be applied to uncover viewpoints of difficult-to-access populations (e.g. serial entrepreneurs). Podcast analysis can provide a novel source of semantic data for qualitative research. Finally, this research applies resource-advantage theory to explain how entrepreneurial competencies help founders develop comparative resource advantages and translate them into competitive advantages in the marketplace.