IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ids/ijesbu/v10y2010i2p224-240.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Starting business networks: benefits and barriers

Author

Listed:
  • Terry L. Besser
  • Nancy Miller

Abstract

Policy makers advocate forming business networks to promote Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) innovation and success. However, past research concludes that owners of small businesses are reluctant to join networks and work cooperatively. In this study, we describe the process of, and challenges involved in, forming four new networks among SMEs in rural towns in the US Midwest. Findings reveal the importance of the convener in successful network formation, the role of culture in the Hispanic immigrant business network and the relationship between trust and resource exchanges among members. The possibility of substituting institutional trust (in the convener) for intramember trust in facilitating research exchanges is suggested. Two of the four networks failed to form or dissolved. It may be unrealistic at the current level of knowledge to expect a higher level of new SME network success.

Suggested Citation

  • Terry L. Besser & Nancy Miller, 2010. "Starting business networks: benefits and barriers," International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 10(2), pages 224-240.
    • Handle: RePEc:ids:ijesbu:v:10:y:2010:i:2:p:224-240
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=33110
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Robert Newbery & Matthew Gorton & Jeremy Phillipson & Jane Atterton, 2016. "Sustaining business networks: Understanding the benefit bundles sought by members of local business associations," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 34(7), pages 1267-1283, November.
    2. Ruchita Pangriya & Shobha Pandey, 2024. "Development in rural entrepreneurship and future scope of research: a bibliometric analysis," Journal of Global Entrepreneurship Research, Springer;UNESCO Chair in Entrepreneurship, vol. 14(1), pages 1-16, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ids:ijesbu:v:10:y:2010:i:2:p:224-240. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sarah Parker (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.inderscience.com/browse/index.php?journalID=74 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.