Human, Social and Institutional Capital - An Exploratory Analysis of Capital Forms in Entrepreneurial Leadership Development

组织发展需要人力和社会资本，这一点已经得到了相当充分的确认。人力资本是指个人的知识、技能和能力，如企业管理技能、谈判或战略思维。社会资本是指存在于个人和组织层面的关系和网络。后一种资本形式有助于获得其他重要的个人和资源，这些个人和资源可能有助于组织及其能力的发展。有效的领导力发展需要把重点放在发展两种资本形式上。这对创业企业或中小企业尤其重要，因为它们的发展和挑战要求与规模较大的企业明显不同。例如，研究表明，与大公司相比，小公司扫描环境的能力相对有限。因此，人际关系和社会网络的发展可以为小公司及其领导人提供获得关键信息的途径，这些信息将使他们能够预测和评估有价值的商业机会或减轻潜在的经济威胁。因此，社会资本对中小企业至关重要。除了人力资本和社会资本，最近的研究表明，创业领域的领导力发展需要制度资本的发展，即正式的结构和组织。这些结构和组织受到网络参与者遵守的一套规则、程序和规范的支配，社会网络是制度资本形成的机制。这项研究还表明，上述三种资本形式之间存在动态的相互作用。社会资本根植于制度资本之中——前者对于建立后者至关重要，后者反过来又促进信任、合作和进一步社会资本的发展。然而，关于人力资本、社会资本和制度资本之间的关系，它们产生的具体机制和过程，以及它们如何促进或限制创业企业和中小企业中的创业领导力发展的问题仍然存在。例如，人们可能会质疑企业家行为者如何能够设想新的实践，说服，影响和领导他人，同时融入制度领域，这些领域制约了他们的认知，定义了他们的利益并产生了他们的身份。如果我们考虑对企业家人格的研究，这个概念就有问题了，企业家人格的特征是警觉、坚定和非传统的思想家，他们推动了熊彼特形式的创造性破坏。在极端情况下，它将模棱两可的符号输入的解释者视为信息的客观处理者，而未能认识到人的能动性和创造力。因此，有相当大的空间来探索人力、社会和制度资本的相互依存概念，以及它们与创业企业中的领导者和领导力发展的关系。研究设计将是定性的和纵向的。将利用对来自行动学习组的一组参与者的个案研究作为一种调查方法，并以深入的半结构化访谈作为收集数据的主要手段。有可能通过领先企业与发展（LEAD）项目来寻找研究参与者，这是一个领导力和管理发展项目，由创业与企业发展研究所和兰开斯特大学管理学院共同开发，面向英格兰西北部的微型企业。分析将按照定性的、解释主义的方法进行归纳。

It has been fairly well established that organizational development requires human and social capital. Human capital refers to the knowledge, skills and abilities of the individual, such as business management skills, negotiation or strategic thinking. Social capital refers to the relationships and networks that exist at the individual and organizational levels. This latter capital form facilitates access to other significant individuals and resources that can potentially contribute to the development of organizations and their capabilities. Effective leadership development requires that emphasis be placed on developing both capital forms. This is particularly important for entrepreneurial ventures or SMEs, as their development and challenge requirements are notably different from their larger counterparts. For example, research has shown that smaller firms have a relatively limited capacity for scanning their environments in comparison to their larger counterparts. It follows that the development of interpersonal relationships and social networks could therefore provide smaller firms and their leaders with access to critical information that will position them to anticipate and assess valuable business opportunities or mitigate potential economic threats. Social capital is therefore crucial for SMEs. In addition to human and social capital, recent research suggests that leadership development in the entrepreneurial domain requires the development of institutional capital, that is, formal structures and organizations. These structures and organizations are governed by a set of rules, procedures and norms that network participants abide by, and social networks serve as mechanisms through which institutional capital emerges. This research also suggests a dynamic interplay between the three aforementioned capital forms. Social capital is embedded in institutional capital - the former is essential for building the latter, which in turn fosters trust, cooperation and the development of further social capital.However, questions persist regarding the relationships between human, social and institutional capital, the specific mechanisms and process by which they emerge, and how they facilitate or constrain entrepreneurial leadership development within entrepreneurial ventures and SMEs. For example, one may question how entrepreneurial actors are able to envision new practices, persuade, influence and lead others, whilst being embedded in institutional fields that condition their cognitions, define their interests and produce their identities. This notion is problematic if we consider research on the entrepreneurial personality, characterized as the alert, determined and unconventional thinker who drives the Schumpeterian form of creative destruction. At the extreme, it renders the interpreters of ambiguous symbolic inputs as objective processors of information, and fails to recognize human agency and creativity.Hence, there is considerable scope to explore the interdependent concepts of human, social and institutional capital, and their relationship with leader and leadership development in entrepreneurial ventures. The research design will be qualitative and longitudinal in nature. A case study of a cohort of participants from action learning sets will be utilized as a method of inquiry, with in-depth semi-structured interviews as a primary means of data collection. Access to study participants will potentially be sought through Leading Enterprise and Development (LEAD), a leadership and management development program delivered to micro businesses in the North West of England, developed by the Institute for Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development and Lancaster University Management School. Analysis will be conducted inductively in line with a qualitative, interpretivist approach.