ABOUT THE CONFERENCE

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The 7th version of this Conference and Symposium aims to advance our understanding of entrepreneurship-as-practice, foster network ties, facilitate collaborative writing relationships, and build a strong community of practice scholars. To do so, we have developed a Research Conference that includes keynote lectures, panel sessions, paper pitches and a working paper development session. Furthermore, we have developed a Symposium for scholars and PhDs new to practice theories. The Symposium aims at educating interested scholars as well as helping to develop empirical and conceptual papers regarding the ‘practice turn’ taking place in entrepreneurship studies. 

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Building on the first (February 2016 at VU Amsterdam), second (February 2017 at University College Dublin Quinn School of Business), third (April 2018 at Linnaeus University), fourth (April 2019 at Nantes Business School), as well as fifth and sixth (virtual events) Entrepreneurship-as-Practice (EaP) conferences, this conference and symposium bring the growing community of researchers who embrace the “practice turn” back to Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

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The 7th EaP Conference and Symposium will include keynote addresses by Dr. Paul Spee (University of Queensland), Dr. Emma Bell (The Open University) and Dr. William B. Gartner (Babson College), as well as panel discussions by Dr. Henrik Berglund (Chalmers University of Technology), Dr. Raghu Garud (The Pennsylvania State University),  Dr. Jean Pascal Gond (Bayes Business School), Dr. Friederike Welter (Institut für Mittelstandsforschung (IfM) Bonn and University of Siegen, German) and Dr. Renate Meyer (WU Vienna). 

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We will also be launching the new Research Handbook on Entrepreneurship as Practice coming out April 2022. We will have roundtables with the authors to discuss their ideas. 

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Finally, there will be a special information session for the (forthcoming) Call for Papers in Human Relations Special Issue titled "Organization-Creation: Theorizing the Processes and Practices of Entrepreneuring at Work" Deadline: 1 April 2023. Guest Editors are: Claire Champenois, Dimo Dimov, Silvia Gherardi, Daniel Hjorth and Neil A. Thompson with Human Relations Associate Editor: Alessia Contu.

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To facilitate inclusivity and flexibility, the format of the EaP 7th conference will be hybrid, offering a combination of in-person and online sessions. The Conference and Symposium will be held online live at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. Participants can choose to attend one, two, or all three days of the conference and/or the Symposium (fees are calculated on a per day basis) either online or in person in Amsterdam. Participants do not need to submit an abstract/paper to participate in the conference and symposium.

 

INTRODUCTION

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The practice tradition (also known as practice-based studies, the practice approach or the practice lens) forefronts the notion that practices and their connections are fundamental to all social phenomena (Rouse, 2006; T. Schatzki, Knorr-Cetina, & Savigny, 2001). For entrepreneurship it means that people “perform” ventures, startups and firms on an everyday basis through materially accomplished and ordered practices (Chalmers & Shaw, 2017; Hill, 2018; Johannisson, 2011; Vincent & Pagan, 2019). This is to say that descriptions and explanations of entrepreneurship—such as, recognizing, evaluating and exploiting opportunities—are incomplete without the ‘alternate’ description and explanation of how entrepreneurial life is actually lived in and through practices (Gross, Carson, & Jones, 2014; Keating, Geiger, & Mcloughlin, 2013). The term ‘practice’, therefore, does not refer to an ‘empty’ conceptual category of ‘what entrepreneurs think and do’ (Sklaveniti & Steyaert, 2019), but encompasses the meaning-making, identity-forming and order-producing interactions (Chia & Holt, 2006; Nicolini, 2009) enacted by multiple entrepreneurial practitioners and situated in specific (historical) conditions. Therefore, practice theories orient entrepreneurship scholars to take seriously the practices of entrepreneuring as they unfold and are experienced in real-time rather than as they are remembered, or interpreted. Simply put, practice scholars are concerned with the ‘nitty-gritty’ work of entrepreneuring—all the meetings, the talking, the selling, the form-filling and the number-crunching by which opportunities actually get enacted (Matthews, Chalmers, & Fraser, 2018; Whittington, 1996).

 

For background and information on EaP literature, prior conferences, media and other pertinent materials, please go to: https://www.entrepreneurshipaspractice.com.

 

PROGRAMME OF THE CONFERENCE AND SYMPOSIUM

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Please find the Final Programme Here.

 

FURTHER INFORMATION

Important Dates:

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February 14, 2022                    Abstract Submission (extended) Deadline (Pitch and PDW)                                             

February 15, 2022                    Notification of Acceptance (Pitch and PDW)

March 14, 2022                         Full Paper Submission Deadline (PDW) 

April 1, 2022                              Registration Deadline (All participants)

April 4, 2022                             New Scholar and PhD Symposium 

April 5 - April 7 2022               Conference Dates

 

Conference Fees:

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Participants can choose to attend one, two, or all three days of the conference and/or the Symposium (fees are calculated on a per day basis). Participants do not need to submit an abstract/paper to participate in the conference and symposium. There are no fees for the Symposium (April 4th), as we seek to encourage new PhDs and interested scholars to join. The fee for each day of the Conference (April 5-7th) is 45 euros per day (for both in-person and online). When you register, you will indicate which days you will like to join and pay for those days specifically. The conference fee covers the cost of lunches and coffee services during the conference (for those attending in-person), as well as costs associated with hosting the online platform, website and registration system. Those that choose to travel to Amsterdam are responsible for their travel and accommodation. 

 

Registration:

Register here!

 

Questions:

EAP7conference@gmail.com

 

 

References

Chalmers, D. M., & Shaw, E. (2017). The endogenous construction of entrepreneurial contexts: A practice-based perspective. International Small Business Journal: Researching Entrepreneurship, 35(1), 19–39. https://doi.org/10.1177/0266242615589768

Chia, R., & Holt, R. (2006). Strategy as Practical Coping: A Heideggerian Perspective. Organization Studies , 27(5), 635–655. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840606064102

Gross, N., Carson, D., & Jones, R. (2014). Beyond rhetoric: re-thinking entrepreneurial marketing from a practice perspective. Journal of Research in Marketing and Entrepreneurship, 16(2), 105–127. https://doi.org/10.1108/JRME-01-2014-0003

Hill, I. (2018). How did you get up and running? Taking a bourdieuan perspective towards a framework for negotiating strategic fit. Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, 30(5–6), 662–696. https://doi.org/10.1080/08985626.2018.1449015

Johannisson, B. (2011). Towards a practice theory of entrepreneuring. Small Business Economics, 36(2), 135–150. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-009-9212-8

Keating, A., Geiger, S., & Mcloughlin, D. (2013). Riding the Practice Waves: Social Resourcing Practices During New Venture Development. Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, 38(5), 1–29. https://doi.org/10.1111/etap.12038

Matthews, R. S., Chalmers, D. M., & Fraser, S. S. (2018). The intersection of entrepreneurship and selling: An interdisciplinary review, framework, and future research agenda. Journal of Business Venturing, In Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusvent.2018.04.008

Nicolini, D. (2009). Zooming in and out: studying practices by switching theoretical lenses and trailing connections. Organization Studies, 30(12), 1391–1418.

Rouse, J. (2006). Practice theory. In D. M. Gabbay, P. Thagard, & J. Woods (Eds.), Handbook of the Philosophy of Science (Vol. 15, pp. 500–540). Elsevier. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-044451542-1/50020-9

Schatzki, T., Knorr-Cetina, K., & Savigny, E. von. (2001). The practice turn in contemporary theory. (T. R. Schatzki, K. Knorr-Cetina, & E. von Savigny, Eds.). London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0956-5221(03)00029-0

Sklaveniti, C., & Steyaert, C. (2019). Reflecting with Pierre Bourdieu: Towards a reflexive outlook for practice-based studies of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, (forthcoming), 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1080/08985626.2019.1641976

Vincent, S., & Pagan, V. (2019). Entrepreneurial agency and field relations: A Realist Bourdieusian Analysis. Human Relations, 72(2), 188–216. https://doi.org/10.1177/0018726718767952

Whittington, R. (1996). Strategy as practice. Long Range Planning, 29(5), 731–735. https://doi.org/10.1016/0024-6301(96)00068-4