A fascinating insight

The Entrepreneurial Paradox: Examining the Interplay between Entrepreneurial and Management Thinking
Lianne Taylor
Palgrave Macmillan;
Hb £104.50

The Entrepreneurial Paradox is a fascinating read for those interested in this specialist area. The book clearly explores the synergy between theory and experience using case studies throughout to illustrate points made.

The book combines psychological theory with business practice, examining areas such as decision-making, cognitive learning, heuristics and biases, and explores the methodology behind combining these areas together. Theoretical perspectives are brought out and explored in early chapters and show the development of themes central to the book's research aims.

Using narrative from interviews combined with the findings from various sources of literature, the author powerfully gets behind the thought process of the entrepreneur. She provides real-world issues and how these were solved, so it is fascinating for an occupational psychologist to read.

Later chapters examine time and conceptual frameworks around business growth, again, using evidence from qualitative data. There is also an interesting reflective view specifically on leadership within an entrepreneurial context. This is presented in quite a short chapter, which is a shame as some of the concepts drawn out of the research, such as leader–member exchange and transformational leadership, could have had much more input from the qualitative data and had even greater narrative. The book concludes by bringing together all the strands and suggesting further areas for research.

For some, the academic base of this work may be off-putting; it does read like a PhD thesis in many places. However, it offers a fascinating insight into entrepreneurial thinking, which is often different to managerial thinking as the book readily explores.

- Reviewed by David Biggs, Programme Director Occupational Psychology, University of Gloucestershire and Managing Director of ADS Ltd