Why and how is it that some individuals decide they want to create businesses and then actually do so? Why and how is it that others do not, even though they appear to have what it takes to succeed in business? These two questions were among the first that researchers in the field of entrepreneurship tried to answer. Today, it seems that the problem is much more difficult to solve than it first appeared thirty years ago. It is not enough for someone to have a strong desire for achievement or a high tolerance for risk in order to choose an entrepreneurial career path. The venture creation phenomenon is a complex one, covering a wide variety of situations. We can no longer expect multiple criteria, or additive and linear models, to be wholly predictive, although they may have a ‘here and now’ probabilistic predictive power.

The main purpose of this book is to present a generic model and a theoretical framework of the entrepreneurial process in order to improve our understanding of its complexity. The qualitative model developed here is based on numerous research findings in the field of entrepreneurship and my own research programme which began in the 1990s. Therefore, this work is based on hundreds of new business creation cases that I have observed and supported over this period.

Before presenting the contents and positioning of this book, I feel it is important to give a dual historical perspective in this introduction.