Entrepreneurial Agency in Information Technology Creation

Entrepreneurs are typically resource poor when they set out to create their IT innovation. They must seek out and use resources that they do not have to create their innovation. How they do so is at the heart of this study. Successful realisation of such innovations requires collective effort, involving resources and actors both internal and external to the entrepreneur's own venture. The study is qualitative in nature and uses the grounded theory method to collect and analyse data obtained from interviewing entrepreneurs and collective agents involved in creating IT innovations. The study found that entrepreneurs act to acquire and guide the services of the collective agents to aid them in creating the IT innovation. With specific reference to IT innovation, software development expertise was found to be a critical resource requirement. This process that the entrepreneur undertakes can be explained through a process of entrepreneurial agency that comprises six discrete steps.