The Resource-Based View, Resourcefulness, and Resource Management in Startup Firms: A Proposed Research Agenda

The resource-based view (RBV) provides a rich framework for analyzing the role of a firm’s tangible and intangible resources in creating and sustaining competitive advantage. As a result, it has been widely used to explain entrepreneurial firms’ strategic choices that generate such an advantage. While researchers have established the usefulness of the RBV, they have overlooked the fundamental question of how entrepreneurial firms manage their resources to gain competitive advantage. This paper examines this issue in the context of independently owned startups, which typically lack resources, are constrained in their access to key resource providers, and have limited experience in assembling and managing resources. Adopting a broader conceptualization of startups’ resource management process, the paper identifies several questionable assumptions in related RBV-based research. Further, recognizing the limits of RBV to determine ex ante the nature and magnitude of entrepreneurs’ resourcefulness when managing their resources, the paper suggests linkages between the RBV and several entrepreneurship frameworks and outlines promising research questions.