Understanding and motivating student feedback seeking: Insights from a lean startup based entrepreneurship program

Understanding and motivating students' feedback seeking behavior is essential for the success of lean startup based entrepreneurship programs. Therefore, in this study, we investigated how cost-value perceptions and student social capital influence feedback seeking behavior and entrepreneurial self-efficacy as the outcome. Longitudinal data were collected from 289 Dutch students who completed a questionnaire at the beginning, middle, and end of an experiential entrepreneurship program that employed the lean startup method. Results showed that students who valued the feedback and perceived supportive student-student relationships sought feedback more frequently, which subsequently, increased entrepreneurial self-efficacy. Neither perceived costs of feedback seeking, such as the risk of feeling embarrassed and investment of time and energy, nor supportive teacher-student relationships related to feedback seeking frequency. We expected that students' relationships with teachers and peers would moderate the relationship between perceived feedback seeking cost and feedback seeking frequency. Results confirmed that cost of feedback seeking only negatively related to feedback seeking frequency when students perceived poor student-student relationships. The findings contribute to a better understanding of student feedback seeking and effective lean startup based experiential programs.