Qualitative content analysis on critical decisions in the entrepreneurial context

Entrepreneurial decision-making is an important topic of study in the field of entrepreneurship research. The main objective is to understand which decisions are taken by entrepreneurs, and what characteristics the decision-making process can be found in a business creation context. There are advances in this area, but they turn out to be fragmented. This fragmentation makes it challenging to have an integrated view of what we currently know about entrepreneurial decision making (Shepard et al., 2014).
One of the complexities in this context is the fact that there are different levels or dimensions when we analyze entrepreneurial decisions. Decisions are a cross-cutting issue in any human activity, and they are a fundamental part of many processes and systems. They help to choose a path to achieve objectives. Besides, we should differentiate between operational, tactical, or strategic decisions. All of these have their importance in a specific context. Still, when it comes to analyzing decision-making in the entrepreneurial context, we should put the focus on strategic decisions (Vermeulen et al., 2008).
Therefore, the main goal of this study is to identify the critical or key – strategic - decisions through a qualitative content analysis of cases studies. ... mehrIn addition, we classify these critical decisions by relating them to different elements of choices, activities, and processes.