• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
• /
• v.18 no.1
• /
• pp.125-140
• /
• 2023

Careful preparation for a start-up can lower the risk of failure and create a successful business model. However, there are still challenges for middle-aged entrepreneurs, as start-up services and policies are often not readily accessible or fully utilized. Despite active research on middle-aged start-ups, previous studies have not delved deeply into the demographics of start-up preparation and various preparation behaviors. In response to this, a study was conducted to identify which start-up support services middle-aged entrepreneurs use, and how start-up preparation can be classified based on this. Data from 324 middle-aged tech start-up owners, based in Seoul and who started their businesses within the past 7 years, was collected and analyzed. The results showed that middle-aged entrepreneurs had moderate start-up preparation, with the greatest focus on the preparation period and the least focus on start-up education. Latent Profile Analysis revealed three groups of start-up preparation types among middle-aged entrepreneurs: "Overall Tribal Type," "Lack of Start-up Education Type," and "Comprehensive Preparation Type." BCH was performed on start-up satisfaction, start-up competence, fear of failure, access to start-up services, and support needs for middle-aged entrepreneurs based on the preparation type. The results showed that "Overall Tribal Type" had statistically lower start-up satisfaction, competence, and service accessibility compared to the other groups. Meanwhile, "Comprehensive Preparation Type" had a statistically lower fear of failure than the other types. "Overall Tribal Type" also had lower accessibility to middle-aged start-up services. All types had a high recognition of the need for support for specialized middle-aged start-ups. The findings highlight the need for more comprehensive support for middle-aged entrepreneurs. This could include expanding support projects to enhance their level of preparation, providing customized support based on their level of preparation, and improving the visibility and accessibility of start-up support services for middle-aged individuals. Additionally, specialized education that addresses the characteristics of middle-aged individuals should be provided.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
• /
• v.19 no.5
• /
• pp.29-44
• /
• 2024

Recently, with the retirement of baby boomers, middle-aged and older people's entrepreneurship has become an issue that is receiving attention as a second career. However, existing literature has mainly focused on the entrepreneurial intention or entrepreneurial performance of middle-aged and older people, and above all, there is insufficient understanding of the antecedent factors that make it difficult for middle-aged and older people to start a business. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the effect of middle-aged and older people's indecisiveness preparing for starting a business on their fear of failure in starting a business. In addition, it aimed to verify the effects of public self-awareness and negative external evaluation as antecedent factors that affect the fear of failure of prospective middle-aged and older entrepreneurs. For empirical analysis, a survey was conducted on 221 men and women aged 45 to 64 who were willing to start a business. The results of the empirical analysis showed that indecisiveness significantly affected public self-awareness, negative external evaluation, and fear of failure in starting a business. In addition, public self-awareness and negative external evaluation were confirmed to be related to the fear of failure in starting a business. All hypotheses were supported as a result of the hypothesis verification. The significance of this study lies in the fact that it reinterprets the negative aspects of middle-aged and older adults' indecisiveness and fear of failure in starting a business from a positive perspective, and based on the results of this study, it provides practical implications for resolving the indecisiveness and fear of failure in middle-aged and older adults preparing to start a business.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
• /
• v.18 no.3
• /
• pp.45-60
• /
• 2023

In this study, we analyzed the influence of middle-aged office workers' entrepreneurial competency and entrepreneurial opportunity recognition on entrepreneurial intention by mediating entrepreneurial opportunity evaluation. Sub-variables of entrepreneurial competency were classified into prior knowledge, positive attitude, and social network. For the empirical analysis of this study, an online survey using Naver Office was conducted for about 15 days (February 6, 2023 - February 20, 2023) targeting office workers across the country who are interested in starting a business, and a total of 262 copies were collected and missing values. For 250 copies excluding 12 copies, SPSS Ver.24.0 and PROCESS MACRO Model 4.0 were used for empirical analysis. The results of the analysis are as follows: First, the higher the prior knowledge of the founder's individual competency, social network, and entrepreneurial opportunity recognition, the higher the entrepreneurial opportunity evaluation and entrepreneurial intention. On the other hand, it was found that the positive attitude among entrepreneurs' individual competencies did not affect entrepreneurship opportunity evaluation and entrepreneurial intention. In addition, the magnitude of the influence on entrepreneurial opportunity evaluation and entrepreneurial intention was in the order of entrepreneurial opportunity recognition, prior knowledge, and social network. This is because the positive attitude of middle-aged office workers towards start-up has a negative image of start-up due to the shrinking start-up environment due to COVID-19, fear of failure due to lack of preparation for start-up, and successive cases of start-up failure due to cognitive bias errors due to overconfidence. implying that there is Second, it was found that the evaluation of entrepreneurship opportunities had a significant positive (+) effect on entrepreneurial intention in a situation where the entrepreneur's individual competency and entrepreneurial opportunity recognition were controlled. Third, the startup opportunity evaluation was shown to mediate between the prior knowledge of the entrepreneur's individual competency, social network and entrepreneurial opportunity recognition, and entrepreneurial intention, but it did not mediate between positive attitude and entrepreneurial intention. Fourth, among the factors influencing entrepreneurial opportunity evaluation and entrepreneurial intention, entrepreneurial opportunity recognition was found to be larger than founder's individual competency, confirming the importance of entrepreneurial opportunity recognition. Fifth, it was found that prior knowledge and network, which are individual capabilities of the founder, affect the evaluation of entrepreneurial opportunities and entrepreneurial intention, so that strengthening entrepreneurship education to recognize the importance of cultivating prior entrepreneurial knowledge and experience can revitalize middle-aged office workers' entrepreneurship. confirmed.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
• /
• v.19 no.5
• /
• pp.231-245
• /
• 2024

While the large-scale retirement of the second baby boomers is predicted, new beginnings such as re-employment and start-up of prospective retirees who attempt to switch careers before and after retirement based on the skills and expertise accumulated in the industrial field are very important in terms of society. Therefore, this study established a research model based on Shapero's start-up event model, a representative theory explaining start-up intention and behavior. In the direct variable affecting the start-up motivation of prospective retirees, factors affecting positive (+) and negative (-) factors In order to comprehensively grasp it, family support and the burden of failure were set as parameters to verify the effect of these factors on the intention to start a business. As a result, a positive (+) influence relationship was found on the effect of the retiree's start-up motivation on the burden of failure, the start-up motivation on the family support, the start-up motivation on the start-up intention, and the family support on the start-up intention. It was found that the start-up motivation had a positive (+) effect on the start-up intention through family support. In other words, for prospective retirees, who are mainly middle-aged, the threshold for start-up has been very low due to technological advances, but nevertheless, family support was found to be a very important factor in the conditions of investing retirement funds and capital, which are important in family relationships. However, it was confirmed that the burden of failure had a negative (-) effect on the start-up intention, and the loss of investment and fear of repayment of the loan appeared as a large burden. Accordingly, it is proposed that prospective retirees who are considering starting a business be able to thoroughly prepare for a start-up through the support of their families, and to operate a specialized outplacement start-up education program that can learn about raising funds and efficient management of funds. It is expected to systematically support retirees' preparation for start-ups, reduce the burden of failure, and ultimately increase the likelihood of a successful start-up.