Empirical Study of Barriers to Women Entrepreneurship in Florida

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Abstract

The title of the proposed research study is "Empirical Study of Barriers to Women Entrepreneurship in Florida." Existing literature documents many barriers to women entrepreneurship such as lack of knowledge about the entrepreneurial process, government bureaucracy, lack of business financing, lack of qualified personnel, lack of government support, lack of role models, lack of networking resources, and low self- confidence (Minniti & Arenius, 2003; Brindley, 2005). However, there are many variations on the impact and significance of these barriers depending on the context (Akehurst, Simaro & Mas-Tur, 2012). Exiting research in entrepreneurship calls for empirical research in geographically narrower contexts because broad-scoped research findings (e.g., global entrepreneurship studies such as GEM – Global Entrepreneurship Monitor - have samples from 25 developed, developing and underdeveloped nations) lend to weak recommendations for policy reforms due primarily to context differences. Each context requires an empirical determination of specific barriers to women entrepreneurship, and in the state of Florida such a focused empirical study in current time periods is lacking (Bates, 2007; Movahedi & Yaghoubi-Farani, 2012). Intention to start business is the primal force that leads to the act of entrepreneurship. This research study examines "intention to start a business" as a function of the prevailing barriers in the current context of the state of Florida. Data from 300 potential (not those who have started a business already) women entrepreneurs (broadly diversified across age, education levels, income levels, family status) in the state of Florida will form the empirical base for this study. The survey will be pretested and executed by Qualtrics, a professional survey-based data collection firm. Statistically significant barriers that reduce the intention to start new businesses from this study will be compared with those identified in other research studies to draw insights on whether the state of Florida would require different strategies to promote women entrepreneurship. The study will conclude with limitations of the current research and implications of its findings for policymaking and future research. The PI (principal investigator) of this research study already completed a similar study in the state of Alabama with the largest survey at state level ever done in the US on women entrepreneurship (n=1200); and has two publications and one conference paper from that research database (Chinta, Periatt & Banning, 2016; Chinta, Andall & Best, 2017; Chinta, 2017). As such, this proposed study is a replication of the Alabama study in the state of Florida. The proposed target sample for this study (n=300) will be the largest survey in Florida on women entrepreneurship.