IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/sbusec/v64y2025i3d10.1007_s11187-024-00943-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Intensive personal mentoring: accelerators’ secret sauce

Author

Listed:
  • Eyal Rechter

    (Ono Academic College)

  • Gil Avnimelech

    (Ono Academic College)

Abstract

Over the past fifteen years, the startup accelerator sector has emerged as a vital component in the entrepreneurial ecosystem, offering structured support to novice entrepreneurs. This study explores the impact of mentorship within accelerators, shedding light on the critical role mentors play in the success of early-stage entrepreneurs. Utilizing comprehensive data from 779 graduates of Israeli accelerators, we investigate six dimensions where accelerators enhance entrepreneurial success: entrepreneurial human capital, network expansion, fundraising skills, legitimacy, psychological development, and operational progress of the venture. We hypothesize that mentorship amplifies accelerators’ impact across these dimensions. Our findings confirm that founders who engage with personal mentors during accelerators, rather than solely relying on ad-hoc experts, and those with more intensive mentorship experience significantly greater progress across all six dimensions. These findings hold when accounting for background variables. These insights enrich the study of accelerators, emphasizing the value of personal mentorship in enhancing the positive effects of accelerators

Suggested Citation

  • Eyal Rechter & Gil Avnimelech, 2025. "Intensive personal mentoring: accelerators’ secret sauce," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 64(3), pages 1259-1284, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:kap:sbusec:v:64:y:2025:i:3:d:10.1007_s11187-024-00943-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s11187-024-00943-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11187-024-00943-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11187-024-00943-x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

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

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Accelerators; Mentoring; Entrepreneurship; Startups; Founders; Entrepreneurial human capital; Network building; Fundraising; Legitimacy; Psychological development; Operational progress;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L26 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Entrepreneurship
    • M13 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - New Firms; Startups
    • M53 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Personnel Economics - - - Training
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:kap:sbusec:v:64:y:2025:i:3:d:10.1007_s11187-024-00943-x. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.